Chan Tze Law

Chan Tze Law is Associate Director of Singapore's Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music, Music Director of the Singapore Festival Orchestra^[1] and Orchestra of the Music Makers (OMM), and Founding Chief Conductor of the Australian International Summer Orchestral Institute.

First trained as a violinist, Chan graduated from the Royal College of Music, London, where his teachers included eminent British conductors Christopher Adey, John Forster, and the late Norman Del Mar, as well as renowned British concertmasters John Ludlow and Hugh Bean. During his violinistic career he came under the tutelage of American virtuoso Charles Treger and co-founded of one of Singapore's most successful chamber music groups "The Chamber Circle".

Chan is a frequent guest conductor and acclaimed performances of Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances and Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique were broadcast by Australia's ABC FM Classics. His recent return appearances to conduct Mahler's monolithic Symphony No.6 and Shostakovich's Symphony No 8 was described as a "Triumph" by the Australian press. In Singapore, he conducts the Singapore Festival Orchestra as well as the HSBC Youth Excellence Initiative concerts.

Chan made his Singapore conducting debut with the Singapore Symphony Orchestra in 2001 and has conducted orchestras in South-East Asia, Australia, China and the USA. Singapore's Straits Times noted "...it was refreshing to find sensuousness and restraint in equal degree, just when the music needed it most..." President of Manhattan School of Music Robert Sirota; "...The music always comes first with Maestro Chan, followed closely by the musicians he is mentoring through his work, and the audiences for whom he is performing..." World-renowned British conductor and orchestra trainer Christopher Adey hailed his innovative and far-sighted approach to conducting, "...his ability to impart the benefit of his years of experience in so many fields of instrumental music making is formidable..."

The press lauded Chan's recent appearances at the Singapore Arts Festival, The Straits Times praising the Singapore Festival Orchestra's "admirable unison and shared passion" and the Business Times "rapid playing with perfect syncronisation". Chan's work at the helm of conservatory's New Music Ensemble received similar critical acclaim, The Straits Times declaring, "...Under the direction of conductor Chan Tze Law, the cause of new music here today could hardly be in better hands...". Recent premieres of works by Australian composers James Ledger and Douglas Knehans were critically acclaimed and he has also worked with Singaporean composers Ho Chee Kong, the late Leong Yoon Pin, Bernard Tan and the late Tsao Chieh.

Chan's pedagogical interests and activities are international and wide-ranging. He has lectured at world renowned American conducting pedagogue Gustav Meier's graduate studio, and returned twice to the University of Western Australia as Artist-in-Residence. He has conducted at Trinity College of Music in London, Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music in Australia and has received international recognition for developing Singapore's Yong Siew Toh Conservatory Orchestra into one of the best of its type in Asia during his tenure as its founding music director. Most recently, he led Singapore's newest orchestra the Orchestra of the Music Makers to critical acclaim.

At the conservatory, Chan teaches conducting, conducts the New Music Ensemble and also heads the Ensembles and Professional Development Office. He is a member of the National Arts Council's Art Resource Panel, Singapore Symphony Orchestra's Audience Development Committee, Singapore National Youth Orchestra's Management board and the Singapore Armed Forces Music and Drama Company’s Supervisory board.

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