MusICian

NUSWS, which stands for the National University of Singapore Wind Symphony, presents Da Capo I, the first of our new series of annual concerts in
addition to our InTempo series! This concert is also the first concert conducted by our new resident conductor, Mr Leonard Tan, who conducts the VJC
band and many good bands.

Da Capo, an italian term, means back to the beginning, and in this concert, we go back to the very beginning, starting anew with Mr Leonard Tan and the new committee.

We will be featuring the following pieces:

Kirkpatrick Fanfare - Andrew Boyson, Jr.
Fantasia on Black is the Colour of My True Love’s Hair - Mark Camphouse
Sea Songs - Ralph Vaughan Williams
Hymn to the Infinite Sky - Satoshi Yagisawa
Danse Diabolique - Joseph Hellmesberger
Miss Saigon - Claude-Michel Schonberg
Bayou Breakdown - Brant Karrick

and our encore piece… how can we reveal the
encore piece? Shout encore to find out

Concert is on 7th October (next Saturday), 7:30pm at the UCC, the big glass building in NUS beside the Yong Siew Toh Conservertory of Music. Tickets are at $12 each. Please support the first of our Da Capo series!

Interested parties please drop me an sms or Friendster message as usual

Hope to hear from you guys/girls!

ok, please please please make my toe heal fast. please. it’s taking forever. and i’m getting lots of additional pain as well! the stupid infection spread from my toe to some parts of my foot, and now i cannot even wear a slipper without contorting my face because of the pain. simple abrasions became killer sized infections in less than a day. help me…

one week since my last post. man, so many things happened. well, i’m kinda relieved after hearing what mr leonard tan said about my playing. he said i have a nice clarinet tone! makes me feel good because i have been so insecure about my playing these days. i’ve been thinking that i’m begining to sound bad after i started playing the Eb clarinet. ok, not really, i’ve been thinking that my playing has deteriorated ever since i did my clarinet diploma! maybe that was my peak…

my foot hurt so bad today and i was forced to ‘retreat’ from sectionals and go see a doctor. doctor told me that i’d probably need another 5 more days before my foot heals, and he recommended that i don’t remove the toenail first. ok, that’s quite a relief, because i was expecting some kinda minor op that required anesthesia injection and stuff. thank god! he gave me some antibiotic cream and 2 types of antibiotics, 1 which i recognised as something mr png gave me before. haha.

here i am, foot throbbing, thinking if i should go join my friends at sentosa tomorrow. maybe i should just stay put at home in the morning and meet sweetie later in the afternoon. to reduce the chances of further injury! imagine playing ball games with an injured foot! i shudder to even imagine the consequences…

mental note to self: i must not miss anymore German classes…

i feel rather lost nowadays in German lecture. i think i really have to buck up my vokabelheft (vocabulary) and listen more to the exercises on e-daf. sharks. Ich spreche sehr bisschen Deutsch, und verstehe auch sehr bisschen Deutsch! i don’t even know if the 2 sentences above are in correct word order… hahaha. and i wouldn’t have missed the last German lecture if not for my stupid toe!!! those doctors… and that nincompoop who kicked my toe… argh. less anger less anger… can complain but cannot take revenge…

ok, 3 weeks break for NCWO. don’t really know what was going on in yesterday’s practics cos i spent most of the time outside with the recruits and their theory test. and OMG, i better revise theory with them after the break. the questions they popped during the test were pretty atrocious. and i’d better revise my own theory… i forgot certain important things already! general maintaining of instruments going on while mr png and i were playing clarinet duets outside. duets are fun! but how i wish i had my good mouthpiece with me yesterday. felt so out of breath while playing.

toe’s gotten so much better. it was really disgusting yesterday. now when i look at my bandage, it’s clean! so glad. and it hurts much less. only when i accidentally knock it against something, i’d be hurting bad. that’s good news! it means i’d be back to normal by sunday. I HOPE!!! no sport for me for now.

well, i’m supposed to be working on my essay, but my mind is blank. here i am in the computer lab, just finished a German text for submission, waiting to travel to newton later for a lesson with Fiona. will work on the essay and study for the test tonight after NUSWS. right now i just wanna cool my mind down and slack. haha.

thanks to the 2 doctors who couldn’t be bothered with my injury, i’ve been taking the wrong medicine for 2 days and i didn’t even know my toe is inflammed. yes, they sent me for an x-ray. no, they did not even take a proper look at my toe. if they did they would have noticed the swelling and the difference in colour in one large part of my toenail. thanks to them i haven’t been sleeping properly for the past 2 nights because the painkillers wouldn’t have helped anyway. i’m so disgusted with that attitude.

and i thought they were so certain that it must be a muscle injury!

that hospital is a sickening place to go. back then when my dad was admitted there at first, there was this doctor whom i really feel like bashing his face in. because there my dad was in quite a critical condition, and there the doctor was, shouting at my dad and demanding an answer. it’s just disgusting. and the doctor who attended to me that night was taking a phonecall and talking about supper while i was sitting there waiting at his desk.

and they call it medical services… service my foot… literally.

shan’t go into the disgusting details of my injury. i’m just super disappointed with the way the A&E doctors treated me. all that money for some bad diagnosis and silly painkillers. if there are so many doctors like that, then singapore’s healthcare industry is doomed.

there’s nothing more that i could ask for now. i have my courage back, twice the potency! it certainly has been a very trying period of time, but we pulled through, and we are now stronger than ever, as always when we pull through any obstacle. and i’m glad we have courage, because we finally understand that there’s nothing else that we are so sure about. that was the only thing that kept us going through the week, and that is the only thing we long to have and hold on for our dear lives. we have it right now with us, and we will keep it by our side, for the rest of our lives.

that thing is Happiness

despite the bad mood, that is. did quite a lot this week, although i really don’t feel like doing anything much. i guess forcing myself worked for at least 5 days! completed some stuff, photocopied some stuff, took notes and notes and notes, played instrument quite a lot, practised hard for my concert pieces, gave teaching band all my focus, attended all but one lesson. unfortunately, it’s also the most important lesson that i’ve missed this week. well, i guess i’ll really have to get claudia to help me out again.

managed to squeeze in soccer today. quite fun, except for the constant yelling and reprimanding. i know i played badly today, but i just couldn’t focus. it’s terrible, but who cares right? i only know that my legs are tired because i was using a lot more strength to balance myself on the slippery ground. perhaps the only productive thing i did was to pop out from nowhere and score a freak goal.

masterclass yesterday was superb! Marcel Luxen, this belgian clarinettist, is really a master of his instrument! one of the finest tones i’ve ever heard ‘live’, and his playing is influenced by my favourite clarinettist of all time, Karl Leister! my friends and i were simply stunned by even his warm-up. what a nice tone!!! and his interpretation of Stravinsky is simply superb. you know he knows his stuff. the things he corrected were really crucial to the wholesome picture intended by Stravinsky, and it really did make loads of sense after that!

band prac today was kinda productive. but i wish they would respond more to the spontaneous conducting eccentricity of mine. i only want to make music! well, at the end of the practice, Tribute and Triumph sounded quite good, so i’m rather satisfied. after all, it’s only the 2nd time they practised it! marching left much to be desired, but i’m not too worried as they would have enough time to practise. i just hope my stern self didn’t shock too many members.

i’m barely happy despite being productive. i need more courage. because i want to share my courage.

if ever there’s a time i’m ‘forced’ to blog, this is it. i stuck myself in central library, doing nothing constructive and tried to stone an hour of break away so that i don’t have to talk to anyone and i don’t have to face my moodiness. however, bringing my laptop was a huge mistake, and you know i cannot forgive myself if i lugged my laptop around without using it, so there you are. emails, checked. IVLE, checked. silly e-newsletters, read. what else to do? blog.

bad start to the week for me. bad mood yesterday, bad mood today. bad symptoms of sickness, bad lethargy, bad sound when i practised on my Eb clarinet last night, bad focus when i attended film and history (and of course, all other lectures involved). bad lunch, if it’s even considered lunch at all. ate little, slept little, thought a little too much. self reflection was required, and i suspect i did much more than self reflection. i basically wanted to be alone. i just want to be alone for a while. and a while was a little longer than i thought.

so there i was, lunching alone, travelling alone, doing assignments alone, practising alone (with this flautist in the same CFA lobby who was trying to practise the exact phrases of danse diabolique i was practising), stoning in the library alone, sitting in class alone. i guess i didn’t want to be cheered up. that’s why nothing was cheering me up. yup, that must be it.

things, i suspect, aren’t back to normal yet. which about explains why i’m not back to normal. i yearn returning to my normal state. but i brought this upon myself. i did something wrong and i ought to bear the consequences. it really doesn’t depend on how sorry you are; it depends on you not making the same mistakes. but how would you know whether you’ll make the same mistakes or not if you’re not given a chance?

things aren’t the same already. but i really hope that the feelings are the same. i just learnt that emotions are important to history and memory. and i can say that emotions are also important to the future.

i’m drifting off. sorry if you can’t understand what i’m trying to say. because i’m not trying to say anything. i’m probably as confused as you are. all i know now for sure is that i’m in a lousy mood, and nothing seems to be changing it.

maybe it’s about time i channelled my negative ‘energies’ into my music. i pray for a more productive individual practice tonight. hopefully i’ll have some breakthroughs in my playing.

a big thank you to all you guys and girls from NCWO who have made my life different by your presence. concerts and performances are now filled with your voices shouting out ‘Mister Lum!!!’ from your seats (makes me feel quite good, thanks :D), many things in band are done much smoother and more efficiently, teaching theory isn’t such a chore anymore and lastly, thank you for your infectuous laughter and joy. it’s a pleasure to know you all, and let’s work hard together with Mr Png and our teachers-in-charge to give a successful concert and to give SYF our best shot.

thank you all who helped out today at the repairing of instruments, especially jasmine, who had to run here and there; thank you flautists for helping me look after my precious clarinet, thank you librarians for helping us sort out the scores. i look forward to working smoothly with you all

before i explain what the title is about, i’d just like to say that the InClarion guest item was a huge success! we went on stage, under-rehearsed, somewhat nervous and all, but we delivered what was our very best performance yet, having precision and expression as we wanted! it was magical, i tell you. i couldn’t really explain how we made it sound this good. but i guess everyone had good focus, and everyone gave the short performance his/her all! and how we sounded really justified our efforts. fantastic job!

BDAS band sounded quite good! their version of The Merry Widow was really very impressive. i must say that shoichi komiyama is an excellent conductor who can make wonders happen like nobody’s business! an extremely impressive concert with an entire body of big names, many of whom are excellent players, some past their prime, others yet to reach it. i guess in some way i’d wanna be right there with them, as a band director myself, but truthfully, i haven’t included band directing in my future. these few years, maybe. as a career, maybe not. i’m not thoroughly certain yet!

plans for 2007… japan trip!!! exciting man. late may or early september… i vote for late may! exams are over, filing for graduation would be over, convocation won’t be so soon, best timing! then when i’m back from japan, i’d go look for my very first job after getting my degree

ok, now to explain the title… this week’s been rather crazy, because i’ve been switching around, playing Bb Clarinet, Eb Clarinet and even Bb Bass Clarinet. so much so that i think i’ve affected my embouchure in a negative way! now my lips are so sore and painful that i don’t think i can play another note today. not that there’s much of today left. i’d have to play Bb Clarinet and Bb Bass Clarinet next saturday for the Botanical Gardens performance, and i’d have to play Eb Clarinet and Bb Clarinet for sectionals and NUSWS pracs on tuesday and thursday. yup. crazy switching. the ultimate happened today, when i played all 3 clarinets in the same mus’art practice! i was struggling to get a decent bite today. i must remember to borrow the Bass Clarinet mouthpiece…

oh yes, Botanical Gardens performance!!! please come, please come, it’s free, and i promise it’d be fun! for people who missed Mus’Art during Beautiful Sunday, for people who came for Beautiful Sunday but are missing the pieces we played already, here’s another chance to catch Mus’Art Wind Orchestra in action, completely free, at Symphony Lake, Singapore Botanical Gardens! bring your friends and family along to this free event, between 5pm to 7pm on 9th September (Saturday). just come and picnic, hang out and stuff! it’ll be fun, i promise! we’ll be bringing you familiar music from the past, from charlie chaplin to phantom of the opera to music of the beatles to the evergreen 70s! come and enjoy this free event brought to you by Mus’Art Wind Orchestra!

haha