曲目介紹
藉由云转化成水流的作曲动机，作曲家试图表达对万物变化、自然及传统世界观受现代价值挑战后的反思。透过当代音乐语汇来回应中国传统绘画与哲学思想，呈现出一首国乐团的声音庆典。
本曲运用英国管与笙这两种乐器的齐奏与交织，展现两者绝妙的音色，并于最终乐章达到均衡一致的平衡。
将这幅音乐卷轴画作缓缓展开，露出一景又一景的声响画面：缓慢／传统与快速／现代，两种对比交替。第一乐章〈Clouds I〉及第三乐章〈Clouds II〉取材自两首收录于《华秋苹琵琶谱》（1819）的古曲《Floating on the Clouds and Night》、《Moon Over the Island》那原始而遥远、难以言喻的旋律，与棱角分明、技巧精湛的第二乐章〈Streams I〉及第五乐章〈Streams II〉有着非常鲜明的对比。
第二乐章〈Streams I〉及第五乐章〈Streams II〉富节奏感的主题动机与当代丝竹乐团声响的交织，作曲家运用抽象的音乐挥毫出一幅自然、流水、岩石、鸟鸣的声景水墨画。
The idea of clouds transforming into streams is a meditation on transformation and a meditation on nature and on the ancient world being challenged by the literal abstract modern world. Clouds and Streams Entwine is a celebration of the sound world of the Chinese orchestra. A work modeled as a contemporary musical response to Chinese traditional painting and philosophical ideas.
The work revolves around the duo soloists , english horn and chromatic sheng. They are given a large canvas to sound fantastically vibrant together and apart. In the end the stand as equals.
The music plays out in time as a traditional scroll painting is unraveled scene by scene. In alternate- slow traditional/ fast contemporary - movements, balancing soloists and balancing soloists and orchestra. clouds I and II are centred around two pipa melodies published in Shanghai 1819, in the Hua Collection, Floating on the Clouds and Night Moon Over the Island . The wordless melodies in clouds make audible the primal and distant echoes of voices from the past.They provide a classic, melodic contrast and historical foil with streams I and II , which are angular and highly virtuosic.
In streams I and II, the scale like rhythmic motives are entwined with the contemporary chamber orchestra and here the orchestra uses the multitude of Chinese traditional instruments as a calligrapher uses a brush. The extended techniques bring abstract colours, shapes and sonic references to nature : water, angular rock formations and the chirping sounds of birds.