Tung Chung clarinettist, composer and conductor Colin Touchin discusses a life in music with Elizabeth Kerr
The theme to Jurassic Park, argues Lantau resident Colin Touchin, is not very good.
How’s that for a hot take? The instantly recognisable strings from one of the biggest box office hits of all time are mundane and repetitive, and not a strong musical construction according to the composer and City Chamber Orchestra Hong Kong (CCOHK) conductor. Admittedly that’s unfair clickbait from a rambling conversation about music, its history, its place in the world and in the SAR, but it’s also an indicator of how Colin’s musical brain works.
“How do you get better than dinosaurs?” Colin explains with a laugh that titanic composer John Williams’ score doesn’t have to be ‘good’ in this context. It just has to be right. “The music simply has to have a catch and find the perfect motifs that carry you all the way through. Williams absolutely knows what he’s doing. He’s one of the best.” Colin pauses. “I think he might agree with me on this one.”
ON GOOGLE CHAT WITH ELIZABETH KERR L AST MONTH
A MUSICAL BENT
At the risk of sounding trite, Colin, who just turned 69, comes through the computer monitor as jolly, approachable, and every bit as precise as when he’s conducting the Hong Kong Welsh Male Voice Choir (HKWMVC), one of his many ensembles. All business, with a side of irreverence that never loses respect for the music he’s been writing and conducting since he was just 12.
Born in Liverpool – “apparently not far from the house where John Lennon lived, but I don’t think there’s a plaque” – Colin relocated to Manchester aged two, with his musically supportive parents. “There was a piano in the house. I was sent off to do lessons aged eight or nine, though I can’t say I really enjoyed it. Now I’m glad I did it of course. It led me to composing.”
More crucial was discovering the recorder on his eighth birthday. “A friend brought along a plastic recorder, and I was taken with this much more than my guests.” He recalls sitting in a corner with it for the whole party.
Despite his fondness for music, Colin eventually did the right thing and applied to study politics, philosophy and economics (PPE) at Oxford, never thinking he’d be able to study his first love at that level. Fortunately, Oxford denied him entry to PPE and suggested… Music. In 1974 he started the first Oxford Wind Orchestra before heading back to Manchester to complete teacher training. He landed at the University of Warwick in 1989, and like his admission to Oxford he got the gig when Warwick’s first choice dithered over his decision. Colin was the Director of Music at the University of Warwick for 15 years.
There was a piano in the house. I was sent off to do lessons aged eight or nine, though I can’t say I really enjoyed it. Now I’m glad I did it of course. It led me to composing
– Colin Touchin
ON THE BATON
Ask Colin who his influences are and he begins with a knowing nod. The short answer is none, and all. “I know why you asked, and I’m not going to hedge, but I’m inspired by so many composers I wouldn’t want to put them in any sort of order,” he says. As a composer, he reasons, he wants less to sound like anyone so much as have an impact; to inspire praise for a mood a piece evokes, or to create something as intuitive as Williams did. “I’d love to have people say those things about my music. I’m very broad in what I like to write but I like to write for people and for groups.”
Needless to say, when Colin expresses a musical opinion, he knows what he’s about. He likes all kinds of music, but doesn’t think much of rap or country. Before the pitchforks come out it should be noted this is Colin the educator talking. “I don’t feel they stretch music very far,” he says, giving props to performer skills and rap’s impact, and country’s distinct form. “But [rap] isn’t really developing music, as such… Country doesn’t have much potential for growth.” For Colin, music has its red lines. “You could make that argument for many styles of music depending on the limitations of harmony or melody or rhythm,” he argues. “You’re unlikely to hear modern jazz harmony in pop music. You wouldn’t use certain language in a children’s book. Language is limited by its purpose and the same is true for music. That said, we are imitators and we stand on giants’ shoulders. Beethoven is likely never to be duplicated.”
HONG KONG MAESTRO
Colin started his relationship with Hong Kong back in the halcyon pre-millennial days. Annual student recruiting trips for Warwick started in 1996 and found him crossing paths with the likes of CCOHK founder Leanne Nicholls (he’s conducted The Snowman & The Bear with them), Lindsey McAlister at Youth Arts Foundation (then Festival), the Leisure and Cultural Services Department’s Music Office, and Hong Kong Tak Ming Philharmonic Winds (TMW), with whom he did adjudications, summer camps and guest conducting among other things. The CCOHK performed his original Sinfonietta no. 4 (look for the CCOHK on YouTube).
Colin’s credits go on and on, from leading and establishing youth orchestras and festivals worldwide to broadcasting on BBC Radio 3 and RTHK Radio 4 (notably his wind band composition Eclipse), and providing musical education in
Recorder Orchestras (his first love, remember) and is Chief Conductor of the Lufthansa Orchestra in Frankfurt.
Colin’s ultimate Hong Kong connection came when he met his wife Alicia, a jewellery industry pro, in 2008, in her hometown of Coventry, and hit it off. Being of Polish descent, she asked what Colin was up to for Christmas early in their relationship.
“I said I was conducting the City Chamber Orchestra on live television in Hong Kong, and she was rather disappointed,” Colin describes. Christmas is a big deal in Poland so Alicia took the plunge and opted to ask forgiveness rather than permission: A short time later she called with news that she’d bought a plane ticket to Hong Kong. “That was a bit of a statement, on her part. But she realised Hong Kong was an important part of my life, and if she came and liked it, or didn’t, we’d know early on.” Long story short, a trek to the Big Buddha and a bus ride around Lantau did the trick. “This is where we’re going to live,” she said. The couple settled in Caribbean Coast six years ago.
Since he’s lived in Hong Kong full time, Colin’s been active with the CCOHK, TMW, the Hong Kong Sinfonietta and Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra. Readers may also know him as the guiding hand of the HKWMVC and Grace Notes (the a cappella women’s choir), and as the voice of In Touch with Music on RTHK Radio 4, where he recommends chamber, choir and wind band releases. “Apparently ‘in touch with music with Colin Touchin’ is quite an effective pun in Chinese,” he says with a chuckle and a shrug. “I didn’t choose it.”
POST-OMICRON PLANS
Rehearsals have gone back to being tricky, online affairs, but at least in the case of the HKWMVC the digital meetings scratch an itch. “Sometimes they want to get together to sing just for the sake of singing,” Colin notes. “Part of the evening is always just for chatting, for social time, to feel in contact with each other.”
With live rehearsals unlikely to resume for a little while at least, Colin is taking a sudden trip to Warsaw to attend to some personal business. But that doesn’t mean he’s not working on other projects. He’s writing new music, of course, and with hopes of Omicron finally abating, he’s planning new concerts with his various orchestras and choirs. The HKWMVC, in particular, is keen to hit the road and make good on plans that were scuppered over the last two years.
Colin’s also close to finalising a pair of “ground-breaking initiatives,” but he can’t tell us much because they’re still in discussion… Watch this space. Or rather, listen here.