Sunday, September 04, 2005
SP's 50th Anniversary Closing Ceremony (31 August) Performance
It was a nostalgic way to end Singapore Polytechnic's 50th anniversary celebrations. That evening gave us yet another chance to showcase our musical talents in a live performance situation to the school. It was, as usual, graded - which was rather an unfortunate circumstance, considering that everyone agreed that the PA crew that day sucked. As Timothy R put it, "everything that could possibly go wrong went wrong" and that "it was the worst PA crew he had ever seen in his entire life." Hmm. This is not the first time - the Graduation 2005 Performance PA crew were almost as bad.
My group went first - the guinea pigs that first tested the water. It was the dinner reception; so "Waltz for the Moon" probably seemed appropriate (which was probably why we went first). I was on the keyboard using the "pizzicato strings" sound and provided the bass for the team. Well, a minute before we were up, I was testing the sound of the keyboard - seemed OK; no noise/distortion whatsoever. And just through the beginning of the piece - who would have expected it but my amplifier was crackling. I tried to solve the problem with my right hand by decreasing the volume and master gain (while frantically trying to keep pace with my left hand doing the bass). But to no avail - I had to make do with the "pizzicato strings" that seemed to snap after each time I "plucked" it. In the course of all this adjustment, I missed out on several notes and almost even played a few wrong notes.
During our critique session on Friday, Michael pointed out that he had expected me to use the Yamaha portable keyboard instead of the Alesis one - because the Yamaha had the rhythm feature (WALTZ!), which I could have used! I did use it - actually - but only during the rehearsal. Gosh - I had clean forgotten that I could have used the Yamaha one instead. I was too caught up instead on whether the keyboard that I used would sound OK (no feedback, etc). My forgetfulness this time cost my group our timing - which was (quite) all over the place (but which I thought was still acceptable).
Oh well - it's over already - our next performances would be the 4-part renditions of the Bach Matthaus Chorales and the evening "classical-crossover" performance at the Vanda Room (well at least it's indoor). More others will be coming - later.
I've been practising my solo performance piece (Debussy's Reverie) and my scales (Major: C, G, D, A, E, F, Bb, Eb, Ab; Harmonic Minor: a, b, c, d, e, g) this week. I've also tried a few melodic and natural minor scales to accompany my development of the harmonic minor scales.
We also have word that (from Michael's suggestion) that the scheduled end-year DMAT concert might probably be pushed back to end of the second semester next year (somewhere around March). The reason being that most of us are not ready to perform on such a scale. Well - I agree with him - even I need more exposure to the performance setting. It's also beneficial for my Concert Publicity Committee because it means that we have slightly more time for the necessary arrangements (ticket/poster/flyer design, etc.) - but it doesn't mean I'm gonna let my committee slack through the coming October holidays.
12:23 pm *
Sunday, September 04, 2005
SP's 50th Anniversary Closing Ceremony (31 August) Performance
It was a nostalgic way to end Singapore Polytechnic's 50th anniversary celebrations. That evening gave us yet another chance to showcase our musical talents in a live performance situation to the school. It was, as usual, graded - which was rather an unfortunate circumstance, considering that everyone agreed that the PA crew that day sucked. As Timothy R put it, "everything that could possibly go wrong went wrong" and that "it was the worst PA crew he had ever seen in his entire life." Hmm. This is not the first time - the Graduation 2005 Performance PA crew were almost as bad.
My group went first - the guinea pigs that first tested the water. It was the dinner reception; so "Waltz for the Moon" probably seemed appropriate (which was probably why we went first). I was on the keyboard using the "pizzicato strings" sound and provided the bass for the team. Well, a minute before we were up, I was testing the sound of the keyboard - seemed OK; no noise/distortion whatsoever. And just through the beginning of the piece - who would have expected it but my amplifier was crackling. I tried to solve the problem with my right hand by decreasing the volume and master gain (while frantically trying to keep pace with my left hand doing the bass). But to no avail - I had to make do with the "pizzicato strings" that seemed to snap after each time I "plucked" it. In the course of all this adjustment, I missed out on several notes and almost even played a few wrong notes.
During our critique session on Friday, Michael pointed out that he had expected me to use the Yamaha portable keyboard instead of the Alesis one - because the Yamaha had the rhythm feature (WALTZ!), which I could have used! I did use it - actually - but only during the rehearsal. Gosh - I had clean forgotten that I could have used the Yamaha one instead. I was too caught up instead on whether the keyboard that I used would sound OK (no feedback, etc). My forgetfulness this time cost my group our timing - which was (quite) all over the place (but which I thought was still acceptable).
Oh well - it's over already - our next performances would be the 4-part renditions of the Bach Matthaus Chorales and the evening "classical-crossover" performance at the Vanda Room (well at least it's indoor). More others will be coming - later.
I've been practising my solo performance piece (Debussy's Reverie) and my scales (Major: C, G, D, A, E, F, Bb, Eb, Ab; Harmonic Minor: a, b, c, d, e, g) this week. I've also tried a few melodic and natural minor scales to accompany my development of the harmonic minor scales.
We also have word that (from Michael's suggestion) that the scheduled end-year DMAT concert might probably be pushed back to end of the second semester next year (somewhere around March). The reason being that most of us are not ready to perform on such a scale. Well - I agree with him - even I need more exposure to the performance setting. It's also beneficial for my Concert Publicity Committee because it means that we have slightly more time for the necessary arrangements (ticket/poster/flyer design, etc.) - but it doesn't mean I'm gonna let my committee slack through the coming October holidays.
12:23 pm *
