“I’m very conscious of what’s idiomatic to these instruments, respecting the musical idiom of the tradition. But I also try to find ways to make the instrument speak in a way that doesn’t necessarily conform to convention… it’s always a process of compromise and negotiation.”
Yan Ee Toh
Yan Ee Toh is a Singaporean composer whose music fuses elements of spontaneity and organicity. Yan Ee’s music deals with dichotomies within nature — both the phenomena of our physical world, as well as the nature of things; her works explore gestures through the amalgamation and morphing of timbres and harmonies, with an interest in interdisciplinary work and traditional instruments. Yan Ee’s work has been performed across Europe, Asia, and America, by ensembles such as Riot Ensemble, CHROMA, Onyx Brass, TACET(i) Ensemble, Orkest de Ereprijs, and Salastina; accolades include the Boston New Music Initiative Young Composer Competition (Winner), the Priaulx Rainier Composition Prize from the Royal Academy of Music, and a Fromm Foundation Composer Fellowship at the 2025 Composers Conference. Yan Ee completed her undergraduate at Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music (Singapore), and recently graduated with a MMus from the Royal Academy of Music; she has studied with David Sawer, Rubens Askenar, Ho Chee Kong, and Adeline Wong.
On 22 February 2026, Yan Ee’s latest work ‘within a cage of echoes’ will be performed by pianist Ning Hui See at Esplanade Recital Studio, Singapore. Ahead of the premiere, Finn Mattingly caught up with Yan Ee over Zoom, discussing dichotomies, ritual, working with non-Western instruments, timbral reimaginings, and more…
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Finn/PRXLUDES: Let’s start with your multitude of backgrounds and interests. You mention that you’ve recently developed an interest in traditional instruments, such as the erhu, as well as more experimental forces. What led you to composition in the first place?
Yan Ee Toh: I don’t think I ever expected to go down this path. I didn’t come from a musical family, my parents are in the sciences and are both teachers. Growing up, I always wanted to become a teacher of some sort. However, when I was about four or five, I walked past a Yamaha shop and saw the pianos on display. As a kid, you might decide on a whim to learn the piano and then suffer the consequences later. That is exactly what I did — I spontaneously decided to learn piano when I was five.
I wasn’t always very good at it, but I enjoyed having that performance outlet. When I was 13, I joined the school choir — which was completely out of character for me at the time. I was very much an inward person, but I think it opened up a new side of me that wanted to be more expressive.
The most transformative time for me as a musician was probably when I was in my school choirs. In secondary school and junior college, I realised that besides the act of performing, I really enjoyed the communal aspect of making music — being with people and experiencing moments when music actually touches people, or at the very least makes them feel something. That was quite important to me, though I wasn’t sure where I was going after that. At the same time, I started arranging music of various genres — such as pop music and hymns — for my friends in choir and various instrumental settings.
It was a very casual beginning. I didn’t think much about it back then, but over time, I realised that perhaps this was a gift I could develop, which led to more creative arrangements and participating in young composer workshops in Singapore. The decision to go into music at university really came by chance, having applied to other programmes in psychology and public policy and initially being waitlisted for a fully funded composition programme at the national conservatory (Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music). At the last minute, I received a spot and instantly decided to go for it, despite having no formal training.
While studying music for the GCE ‘O’-levels in Singapore, we had an Asian music segment that focused on regionally relevant musical traditions. Given Singapore’s diverse cultural landscape, this included Chinese, Malay, and Indian music, as well as traditions from neighbouring cultures such as Indonesian, Balinese, Japanese, and Gamelan music. There are also many locally based groups that help sustain and promote this cultural richness. As part of our music programme, we studied Gamelan, Malay, and Indian music, and I gained further exposure by attending concerts and participating in school extracurricular performing arts groups. These experiences shaped the way I perceive music, encouraging me to appreciate it beyond a purely Western perspective.
Coming into a conservatoire, I think the focus tends to be very Western-oriented. I’m not opposed to that — I think there needs to be some sort of standardisation — but being based in South-East Asia, there was more to it; I could see things from different angles and draw similarities between different cultures.
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I want to touch on what you mentioned regarding joining school choirs — this felt different to you because it was much more of a community-based exercise than just the piano. Do you think this still plays a role in how you think about musical expression and the musical experience today as a composer?
I think it was a very formative part of my musical journey. I have always been well-supported by teachers and mentors at school. The community I have held onto most closely since graduating is my choir group. That period taught me that music can be impactful in ways you might not see when you are just stuck in your room writing music.
I have struggled with negotiating these different sides of myself. On one hand, I want my music to be impactful, but I also have to find ways to make that impact happen, even if it doesn’t directly touch someone. The experience of singing in a choir — being able to listen to others and be reactive to them — as well as performing in outreach settings outside of traditional performance spaces, was very eye-opening. It helped me develop a purpose for why I want to keep doing music.
You’ve also mentioned having exposure to non-Western musical performance and classical music. How do these experiences impact the way you think about Western concert music, when you are writing for a Western ensemble or pianist? Do they play a role, or are they separate in your mind?
In the past, I’ve often done the opposite. My first compositions working with traditional instruments were for the Singapore Chinese Orchestra’s (SCO) Composer Workshops, which I took part in when I was 18 and 20 respectively — in one of the editions, we were tasked to score a short film for the Chinese orchestra.
One of the comments which emerged at the end of these reading sessions from a more established composer, Wang Chenwei — now composer-in-residence at the SCO — was that the pieces, while scored for a Chinese orchestra, appeared to be much more effectively played by a Western orchestra. At the time, my approach as a young composer was to treat those instruments with a Western lens, since my musical knowledge and upbringing was very much based on conventions that I knew about the Western orchestra. Dealing with a non-Western setting for the first time was daunting, so I resorted to my intuitions about writing for a Western orchestra.
Over the last five years since, I’ve had more opportunities to work with performers of traditional instruments — both locally (in Singapore) and abroad. I’m very conscious of what’s idiomatic to these instruments, respecting the musical idiom of the tradition. But I also try to find ways to make the instrument speak in a way that doesn’t necessarily conform to convention. I try not to write something that is damaging or disrespectful to the performer/instrument; but naturally, it’s always a process of compromise and negotiation. Since then, I have brought that experience into writing for Western instruments: asking myself, how can I make this Western instrument sound like this effect that was producible on this other non-Western instrument? How can I make a similar effect happen?
Locally, there are many fusion ensembles: ensembles that combine instruments from each of these cultures, such as Chinese, Indian, Malayan, and Western instruments. It’s always a challenge to figure out the role of each instrument and how to make the best use of them, and the challenge presents itself differently each time.
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Let’s talk more broadly about your compositional philosophy. You mention that your music explores “natural dichotomies”, and that you’re interested in transformations and spectrums between harmony and timbre. What does this mean for you, and how does this look in practice in your work?
I’ve always been interested in textures and interesting timbres. That comes from my time in choir, but also from having a very messy and all-over-the-place music taste. My Spotify is a bit of a mess at the moment, but my favorite genre has always been house music — producers like Martin Garrix and DubVision, but also more indie producers. I like listening to electronic music and thinking about how I could reproduce that acoustically. I think that’s a very fun challenge. I enjoy the transformation of timbres over time and the movement of sounds within a performance space.
So that fascinates me, first and foremost. Regarding dichotomies, I started out in my undergrad writing lots of music that had many dualities within it; constantly contrasting two musical states. I also liked exploring dual meanings — multiple meanings of certain words, or even multiple implications of a title. I usually give a very Rebecca Saunders-style explanation, a sort of dictionary definition, when I can. My music isn’t strictly programmatic in an aural sense; it is abstract, but it tries to explore different aspects of the concept of the piece.
Let’s delve into your process a bit: your music is very physical in the way you approach instrumentation. What does this embodiment look like in your music, and in the compositional/rehearsal process?
This popped up quite recently while I was working on my MMus project between April and June. I was working on a series of solo pieces to explore the relationship between the performer and the instrument, and how the body is an extension of the instrument — and vice versa, how the instrument is an extension of the body. I had the chance to work very closely with a few performers; and the opportunity to really be in the same room and choreograph the piece together became very important. Early on, I started one piece knowing that I wanted it to be a combination of violin playing and choreography. Initially, I wrote the music and then tried to assign choreography to it, which didn’t work. I then looked into works by Kagel and Jennifer Walshe, and was very fascinated by their work with the stage and music theatre; I realised it made more sense to begin with thinking about the actions and physicality of the performer from the start. We had the chance to work out lots of details together, and the score wound up far more visual in a way.
You also mentioned the importance of rituals in your music — is this something symbolic in the music itself, or is it something about the ritualistic act of the music being played in a concert hall that you try to recreate?
Regarding the “ritual” aspect, I was thinking about how new music is rarely memorised. I wondered how effectively performers could embody these pieces with the score in front of them. With an instrument, of course you can be expressive, but I think this embodiment can be quite difficult to arrive at. While writing a piece for my violinist, Ester Stålberg, I thought about how people become familiar with a ritual. I’ve also made it a point to attend “ritualistic” events with a sort of chanter/leader, and I’ve recently and observed how naturally things come to the person leading the chants; perhaps it’s a lot of hard work, but perhaps it’s also a specific mentality, or psychological state, of this person leading the ritual that impacts the delivery. I wanted to emulate this in my work for both the performer and the audience. At some point, it becomes less of a musical and more of a ritualistic performance.
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I’m very curious about what the process of beginning a piece looks like for you. Do you start off with material, or with these very theoretical aspects you’ve mentioned?
I’m not very “Type A” — so I tend to be very chaotic when I write a piece. It really depends on the piece: sometimes, I’m inspired by noise I hear during my commute, other times, I try to ideate words that could have dual or triple meanings. These inspirations usually serve as a starting point for the concept.
For example, my work ‘relief’ refers to the Italian architectural method of lowering a plane so the sculpture appears to protrude. I tried to replicate this texturally in the piece for a wind quintet — but “relief” also refers to emotional relief, leading me to explore different ways of building tension, letting things simmer towards a climatic moment, and then exploring what follows to create the idea of “relief” (or lack thereof). My pieces usually either start with a word I want to delve into, or a sound I hear, that I don’t want to “recreate”, but instead want to reimagine with the instruments I am using.
Let’s talk a bit more concretely about your work ‘mantle movements #1’ – what was your process like for this work?
‘mantle movements #1’ was for the Steinway-D transducer piano. It just so happened that the Royal Academy of Music had this piano on loan during my second year. It was very new to everyone, including the technicians, so we decided to put on a concert in January. The transducer piano really expands the possibilities of what a single pianist can do because it allows for playback; and can send and receive MIDI information and play it through its transducers. In this way, you could have both the acoustic sound and the electronics. For us, since it was our first time exploring the instrument, the question became [about] what type of music can be written for it that can’t just be played on a simple MIDI keyboard. We wound up exploring this further in a second concert in July as well.
The piece explores how it might feel sinking through the Earth’s crust into the mantle. I recall an article on scientists from MIT picking up sounds from beneath the Earth, such as booms and crackles that you can use to detect fissures or defects that run through the rocks. At lower pressures, there is a lower-sounding boom, and at higher pressures, there is a high-pitched crackling sound. I’m no scientist, but I tried to emulate a similar effect in the electronics of the piece: high pitched “crackling” sounds in the higher registers; metallic long tones in the mid range; and low, resounding rumbles in the lower registers. These were my attempts to complement the material and sounds already occurring within the acoustic piano. Being able to explore this through the transducer piano allowed me to discover more idiomatics specific to the transducer — for instance, with such sensitive keys, you could suppress them softly enough that they would only trigger electronics without any acoustic sound.
I’m not sure I would get this experience again, it was quite a pleasant surprise! But I count myself very lucky to be able to work with not only musicians of various cultures and musical upbringings, but also with new, innovative technologies as well.
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What projects do you have coming up?
On 22 February at the Esplanade Recital Studio, Singaporean pianist Ning Hui See will premiere my piece ‘within a cage of echoes’, specially commissioned for her. We’d both spent time in London and were recommended to each other through mutual contacts. I wrote this for her concert ReSounding, in which she was keen on exploring the resonances within the piano, which is something I’m also interested in.
When I work with Singaporean performers, I often draw from my experiences growing up here, though not with the intention of creating a distinct “Singaporean sound.” There is ongoing discussion within the local arts community about how such a sound might be defined. As a relatively young nation, Singapore’s physical and cultural landscapes have developed rapidly, shaped by influences from both regional traditions and Western practices. Earlier phases of nation-building placed strong emphasis on globalisation and Westernisation, but in recent years there has been a renewed interest in engaging with cultural heritage and identity, which I find meaningful and worth exploring in my own way.
I wouldn’t describe my work as overtly “patriotic”, but I’m interested in highlighting aspects of everyday life in Singapore that are often overlooked. Our country is widely recognised as a major centre for technology, science, and commerce, yet there are many unique and quietly distinctive experiences within its urban environment. Several of my earlier pieces reflect my personal observations of living here, particularly the coexistence of dense city infrastructure with pockets of nature integrated into daily life. At my current workplace, for instance, it’s not unusual to see roosters wandering near grass patches beside a canteen, a small but memorable contrast between urban and natural spaces — something I don’t see in London, or anywhere else for that matter.
Another piece I composed, ‘Caceuphonie’, written for double bassist Charis Hadjisophocleous, centres around the call of the Asian Koel — a bird commonly heard in residential neighbourhoods at dawn, its distinctive cry cutting through the sounds of ongoing construction. For me, these juxtapositions are far more significant than direct references to folklore or traditional cultural markers.
Going back to this piece, ‘within a cage of echoes’ draws from my experience living in my neighbourhood for the past 20 years. The estate has many young families, but it is also home to a large retired community, and one distinctive feature is a “bird singing corner” where residents hang their birdcages. The area hosts a monthly bird singing competition that was especially popular two or three decades ago and still continues today. On weekends, people gather simply to listen to the birds, creating a dense and sometimes overwhelming sonic environment. The space also becomes an informal social hub, where residents sit, chat, and spend time together. Around this corner are several pet shops, which led me to reflect on the idea of assigning monetary value to living creatures. Listening to the birdsong in this setting gradually made me question whether similar value judgments can be placed on music or on musicians themselves.
All of these thoughts eventually led me to think of the birds as parallels to musical works — being evaluated holistically not only on their sound, but also their appearance. This made me think about the ways we’re judged in the public eye, and how everything has to come in a package. In this piece, I explore a musical contrast between the sense of isolation of a single bird enclosed in a cage — subject to pressure and loneliness — and the overwhelming collective energy of dozens of birds chirping simultaneously within a sheltered enclosure.
Alongside Ning Hui’s idea of exploring the piano’s resonance, I wound up using lots of sustained tones across multiple registers, each representing a different point of view, whether that be the perspective of the bird or an observer within a crowd. Together, these layers accumulate, allowing the piano to evoke both intimacy and chaos.
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Yan Ee Toh’s ‘within a cage of echoes’ is being premiered by Ning Hui See on 22nd February at Esplanade Recital Room, Singapore – more information and tickets can be found here:
Learn more about Yan Ee and her practice:
- https://tohyanee.com/
- https://soundcloud.com/toh_yan_ee
- https://www.youtube.com/@tohyanee
- https://www.instagram.com/t.0hyanee/
References/Links:
- Adrian Jack, ‘Obituary: Mauricio Kagel’ (2008), The Guardian
- Jennifer Chu, ‘Boom, crackle, pop: Sounds of Earth’s crust’ (2023), MIT News
- Asian Koels in Singapore, Singapore Animal & Veterinary Service
