Matchups

The melody from the hymn Dies Irae breaks the creamy quiet of a restaurant in upmarket Taipei, and the patrons raise their eyes from their waffles and cake and Vienna coffee. The disrupter of the mid-Thursday morning hush is Chung Yiu-kwong, Taiwan’s most noted classical composer, giving an enthusiastic rendition of the Day of Judgement’s most famous ode. “It’s such a well-known signal for tragedy, demons, devils,” he says, once he has finished, and the gentle clinking of crockery resumes. “That’s why I chose to incorporate a part of it in the piece.”