Wong Jum-sum loved music of all kinds, and had a particularly deep-seated passion for Western classical music.

In the 1950s, both Wong and classical music were finding their feet in Hong Kong society. The best they could do was to openly embrace the unknown.

To embrace the unknown, one needs support from all directions.

Thanks to Radio Hong Kong, Wong was able to listen to enticing music all day everyday, in that process learning to appreciate simultaneously the distinctive worlds of Shankar and Schubert.

Thanks to Leung Yat-chiu, he knew classical music held no special mystical aura. Whatever sounded good was good music.

Thanks to Wong Jum-sum himself, he learnt to read and absorb the principles and practices of making music, no matter whether they came from Bach or Beethoven.

Thanks to Hong Kong of the 1950s, he encountered a succession of visiting maestros, extending immensely his ideas about music and life.

Beethoven: Symphony No.9 in D minor, Op. 125 (4th movement) (1952) (excerpt)

Wong had all the scores of Beethoven’s symphonies on his bookshelves. Wong had a soft spot for no.9. He adapted Ode to Joy into another of his 1980s popular tune The Tidings of Love, sung by Michael Kwan.

Composer: Ludwig Van Beethoven

Performers: Erich Kleiber conducting
The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
with Hilde Gueden (Soprano),
Sieglinde Wagner (Contraito),
Anton Dermota (Tenor),
Ludwig Weber(Bass)