FOR the past few months, Singaporean conductor Darrell Ang has been feeling disillusioned with the classical music scene.

'The industry is changing and I can't say it is changing for the better. There is a lot of commercialisation and it is completely not what it was before, when I decided I wanted to do this,' he told Life! on Wednesday.

Ironically, Ang, 29, became the classical music world's newest star when he won the 50th International Besancon Competition for Young Conductors, part of the renowned Besancon International Music Festival in France, last Saturday.

Ang, who earned his specialist's diploma in symphonic and operatic conducting from the St Petersburg State Conservatory, is the first Singaporean to win the prestigious biennial conducting competition, held in the northeastern French city.

He made a clean sweep of all the awards available, netting not only the Grand Prix of 12,000 euros (S$25,000), but also the Prix Du Public, voted by the audience, as well as another prize awarded by the orchestra.

Past winners include Japan's Seiji Ozawa in 1959, who conducted the Vienna State Opera here on Wednesday, and Singapore Symphony Orchestra music director Shui Lan, from China, who won it in 1981.

Speaking from Paris on Wednesday, where he was waiting for his flight back to the United States, Ang, a graduate fellow at Yale University, said he was so depressed over his career that he almost decided not to go for the competition.

This despite the fact that he was one of only 20 conductors chosen out of 300 hopefuls during auditions held worldwide from March to May.

'Those were some of my darkest days as I was re-examining myself and wondering whether conducting is really what I should do,' said the conductor, who won second prize - no first was given - at the Antonio Pedrotti International Competition For Orchestra Conductors in Italy last year.

He even told friends that he had decided not to go for the French competition as he felt too distracted to prepare for it properly.

'But they all said you should go as you never know what is going to happen,' said Ang, who bought a ticket to France only three days before the competition began on Sept 17.

He was so sure that he wouldn't even make it past the first of the four competition rounds that he did not take his coat-tails and had to borrow a set from a friend for the finals on Saturday.

In the concert-style final, each of the three finalists had to conduct the Ile-de-France National Orchestra in Saint Saens' Introduction Et Rondo Capriccioso, Ravel's Suite No. 2 from Daphnis Et Chloe, and Finale, a specially commissioned piece by French composer Bruno Mantovani, who was part of the six-man jury.

'I was told later by competition officials that the last time a finalist had to borrow coat-tails because he did not bring his was in 1959, with Seiji Ozawa,' he said with a laugh.

He recalled that when the jury president announced that he had won the Grand Prix, he at first did not realise he had won as the president spoke softly and in rapid French.

'When it finally sunk in, I was so tired and at the same time so shocked that I didn't know what emotions I was feeling. It was too unexpected,' he said.

The first person he called with the good news was his mother in Singapore. 'She had just gotten out of bed. She was overjoyed, but sleepy,' said the Anglo-Chinese School (ACS) alumnus, whose father is a purchasing officer and mother an accounts assistant.

After completing his O levels at ACS, he studied piano in Vienna from 1995 to 1998. He completed his national service in 2000, then studied piano and composition for six months at the Royal Conservatory of The Netherlands before being admitted to the St Petersburg State Conservatory, from which he graduated last year.

He regularly conducted the St Petersburg Philharmonic during his time in Russia, and last performed here with the SSO in March at Woodlands, under the Singapore Press Holdings Gift Of Music programme.

SSO music director Shui, who received an e-mail from Ang shortly after his win, said that he was already impressed with the young conductor after seeing a video-tape of him a few years ago.

Said Shui, who co-conducted the SSO with Ang in a concert last July: 'Darrell's body is very coordinated. As a conductor, you can spend years accumulating repertoire, but nothing can help you if you don't have the gift. That, Darrell has.'

He said that after his own win back in 1981, numerous invitations for conducting stints poured in, but he decided to complete his studies at Boston University before taking up any offers.

'Whatever happens now, it is important for Darrell to build up musicianship as he will have at least 40 to 50 years left to conduct,' he said.

Ang, however, is taking things slowly. 'At the moment, I am just in the process of healing, and I am looking forward to good things,' he said.

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'Those were some of my darkest days as I was re-examining myself and wondering whether conducting is really what I should do'
Conductor Darrell Ang on how he felt before the competition