Hi everyone, it’s Dexter and Lishan! As SIBF is tomorrow, we decided to bring you a post to document our journey in the past 2 months or so. Undeniably, this journey was not the easiest one, but we are glad to have come thus far and we are all geared up for our performance tomorrow. Along the way, with the help of our welfare officer, we dropped bits of encouragement for our members. Without a doubt, food is always welcomed, and part of the welfare provided came in the form of food. Our welfare officer Yuan Khai purchased banana cake from a bakery all the way in Johor, and this was a hit amongst our members. Just look at their faces! Two of our members, Levis and Darrick, also kindly prepared a special homemade grass jelly drink for our members. Similarly, this was also a hot favourite with the band and many of us scrambled to get our hands on a cup. We’ll let the following pictures do the talking, shall we? Along the way, we also celebrated Hari Raya and what better way to join in the festivities with more food! We brought a couple of boxes of cookies as a after-band snack for the members and both boxes were wiped out by the end of the night as well. Other than attempting to fill tummies, we also wanted to fill the hearts of our members with encouragement and motivation. We got our members to write little notes of encouragement to each other, which we collected and then distributed last week. We sure hope that the sweet notes gave everyone a boost to push through the final lap! Welfare and food aside, Mr Tan was also a pillar of support to us all. Despite facing numerous challenges, Mr Tan persevered and kept going, imparting as much musical knowledge as he could to the best of his ability to the band. He also constantly provided us with the motivation we very much needed, especially during the period when morale ran low. Of course, we mustn't forget our beloved resident conductor Prof Ho, who was there with us every step of our SIBF journey thus far. Despite his busy schedule, Prof Ho made the effort to drop by for our rehearsals, to speak to us and to motivate us. Here are a few things he shared with us: “Some people believe: To characterise the music quality is through "objective " measurements- dynamic marking, tempo indication etc. Such measurement would end up to be like mathematical and scientific representation.” “Music is a transcendent and highly abstract and subjective art form . Let us all humbly accept it and serve the fickle Muse to the best of our ability.” “These symbols don't reflect musical reality as appreciation of music is a completely subjective human experience. Measurement or technical terms , however can provide a measure of insight but are no substitute for human judgement.” “Music should concern the making of music, not the speculative transcending of its limit. The ear should remain the first and last court of appeal.” We keep Mr Tan and Prof Ho’s words close to our hearts as we embark on our final lap tomorrow. In the meantime, wish us the best of luck for our performance tomorrow, and we hope to bring you good news after tomorrow’s competition!
Till then, Dexter and Lishan Hi everyone! Here are some upcoming events to look out for! Trio camp just concluded over a week ago! A huge thank you to the participants, organizing team and CFA for such an amazing time. If Trio left you wanting more of the NUS Wind Symphony, here are the important upcoming events, save the dates! If you didn’t manage to join Trio 2016, here’s what you missed! More photos can be found on the Trio Camp Facebook page. Also, check out our winning skit here!
Till then Christabel Hi everyone! This is Yuan Khai here and today I will share with you my freshie experience in TRIO Camp 2015! When I was first approached by my senior about TRIO, I thought it would be a simple, normal band camp where we would have several band practices, an intro to a wind band and that’s about it. Never would I have expected to have tons of fun and excitement across 2 short days… Group Experiences The best thing about joining TRIO Camp is that we freshies get to experience the different playing styles of each music group – Jazz Band, Wind Symphony and Symphonic Orchestra. It helps us decide which band’s style would suit us better, and where we would like to continue our musical journey in NUS. Coming from a wind band in junior college, I did not have any prior experience in jazz, which was why the jazz band group experience was an eye-opener for me. As the pieces are usually in swing timing, I found it hard to follow the score but I got used to it after a while. Nevertheless, the pieces we played were really cool and joyful. When I joined Wind Symphony’s group experience, I was overwhelmed by the massive 10-member trumpets section who greeted me with wide arms. It was very enjoyable to play with them, as my seniors guided me patiently and corrected my errors whenever I made mistakes. Since I was in a wind band in my junior college, playing with Wind Symphony is a familiar experience to me and it feels like home. Besides, it was also a joy to play with the NUS Symphony Orchestra. During our practice, I could feel the professionalism in each musician as everyone did their best despite having the need to play the same pieces for hours consecutively. As a trumpet player, the most notable difference I found between SO and WS is that we have to listen carefully to the strings and blend to their sound smoothly, so that we will not drown out their sound. Games Despite our group members being rather awkward with one another initially, the warming up game sessions have been useful in breaking the ice between us, allowing us to get comfy with each other. Masterclasses We got to learn new skills and to improve our playing from professional musicians during the masterclasses. I remember the most interesting thing I learnt was when our tutor taught us how to tap a confusing combination of 2 beats per count with our right hand and 3 beats per count with our left hand. It took me 15 minutes to multitask with my hands and it really wasn’t an easy task (Do try it out yourself!). Skit At the end of our second day, we were given a chance to showcase our creativity by performing a skit with our chosen title – “The Hunger Games”. After several brainstorming sessions, we have decided to make a parody by naming it “Jyh Harng 的 (de) Games” (Jyh Harng was our OGL), a story of how contestants in a game show organized by Jyh Harng strives to impress him. At the end of the day, we managed to win an ice cream voucher… WHICH MEANS post-camp ice cream outing!!!! It was a really enriching camp and I had lots of fun making music and playing games with my fellow group mates. Despite coming from different music groups, this camp has provided us a great opportunity to interact with one another and foster stronger bonds between musicians of the different groups. To end off, here’s a video montage from last year’s TRIO Camp: Hope to see you at the next TRIO Camp! ☺
Signing off, Yuan Khai. |
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