My Pensieve

China... and the Passacaglia

2004-12-29T18:56:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Nothing.

Back from China on Sunday (26th) night, in time for the news of the tsunami... Last I checked the death toll was still rising.

China was fun but there's no place like home... Brought back a bit of stuff, including
a xun or ocarina
a pair of running shoes
a bunch of bird-whistles (they're 1 yuan each)
but not much besides.

Ran through the Passacaglia with sis on Mon... all I can say is we sounded godawful, a week in China had taken its toll on us both. I overexerted very fast. Ouch.

Sounded fine during rehearsal at Annette's house. JS Bach was superb.

Am wondering whether I should apply part-time with Braddell Heights Symphony...

"No one can make you feel inferior without your permission." - can't remember who said this, first thought was Lincoln but I somehow don't think so

Washout.

2004-12-09T22:59:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: 'Ye Ge' by Luo Wei Lun, playing in my head

Yes, I know my blog is growing mould... Well I have finally added a post to it.

Had Chinese Orchestra competition today... Small ensemble, 20 members, without conductor. Well we got knocked out in the preliminary round, which means that the miracle we were hoping for didn't happen, even tho Zhou himself said yes, miracles can happen.

We sounded fine during rehearsal. In fact, my two little juniors, who can't play to save their lives, were actually rarin' ter go. Zhou hadn't a bad word to say about the cellos, a testament to the protective covering I provided for them. Especially in 'Ye Ge'. After some discussion, true ensemble style, it was decided that I should lead the opening of that piece.

A thought about Zhou, our conductor: he's famous for not mincing his words. Throughout the five rehearsals which I attended, the only criticism he ever had of me was that my D and C in the first bar was a bit too loud.

Diversion: MSN - Michelle asked if I wanted anything from Beijing. I replied "Err... Peking duck?"

Back to the topic... Prior to the concert we'd been struggling with latecoming and absenteeism... It's been a while since I last used this term which I coined myself... The players generally have a double AP, which means they have an attitude problem plus an aptitude problem. I mean, come on, they're not like, my standard, which means they some of them are actually still struggling with the notes, and they still don't want to come for rehearsal? What the hell...

A few people scolded me for being arrogant today... Still, the truth is that CO wouldn't stand a ghost of a chance without me. (I told Yiting "Bu shuang ah? Can you afford to take me out of the section?")

The concert was a disaster. Ye Ge places an unusually high premium on the cellos, and the opening was lost to abysmal intonation... I barely had time to wonder what happened to my juniors. Why they were playing so horribly. I mean, it can't possibly be me who's out of tune, right? And they didn't look at me. (F*** them both.) Of course the pizzicatos were all not together.

Follow The Leader, For Goodness' Sake.

Intonation was bad throughout. Dao Chui Lian was better, but Dali Qingfeng was gone. Sigh. Dao Chui Lian was messy, though. The cello semiquavers didn't fit in with the yangqin's. But Yunfeng Laoshi (a friend who helped tutor the CO cellists) said that he'd break a sweat playing it too. Dali Qingfeng had wrong notes... I think that ass Mervyn was playing wrongly again, and didn't even know it... I know he played wrong notes during Ye Ge. He's RI's best next year and he can barely play. (Katherine can't. Which makes my presence even more crucial.)

After all 9 groups (we were the 7th) had played, encouragement started pouring in. Perhaps it was sympathy. Shihui told Zhou I'd a big head. (No apologies there.) Zhou said the cellos were the best. I figured he meant that our cellos were the best of all the groups - no surprise given the presence of the pillar of power which is yours truly, and the fact that the cello parts for all 3 pieces were unusually complex, at least for CO.

They took one hell of a long time with the results. Three groups made it to the finals: Teng Ensemble, Hwa Chong Alumni, and the ruan ensemble, which was fantastic by the way. Hong Wan said that if there was a fourth group it'd be us. Kang Yi said that in his heart (gasp!) we are better than Hwa Chong Alumni. (I didn't manage to catch them onstage.)

As we left, I couldn't help feeling that my section had let me down.

Mum's possessed

2004-09-05T23:13:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Liebeserklarung (Love's Declaration) by me... just started

Just had a ferocious argument with mum... Saw this coming for a long time now... At least those visions of suicide, funerals and whacking her repeatedly over the head with the stool in my room will pass from me now.

I wanted to talk to her, but it's hard to say who talked more. I swear she's pushing me to the point of mental breakdown, but she would have none of it... Eventually though, she agreed to keep quiet about my studies, something that I need quite badly...

Wonder how long she'll keep her word... She's reneged on promises before...

Supplementary

2004-08-31T00:50:00.000+08:00

Mum just came in and stupidly said 'I want you to treat prelims seriously... I expect you to get at least two Bs and a C for prelims, and two Bs and an A for A levels... If your prelim results are not good, I'll confiscate your phone, no more MSN, study for your A levels... If A level results are not good, I won't subsidise anything for you to go overseas...'

Stupid.

Resolution?

2004-08-31T00:01:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Rachmaninov 3rd Symphony

Looks like the little situation took care of itself... She was bluffing after all... Her threat to disallow the piece was quite what I consider to be an empty display of power... even though Esther rightly pointed out that she doesn't need to show power over me...

Mr Song is clearly displeased with Mrs Seah, comes with her talking too much rubbish... and what's that about her blaming me for listening to him? She's not a cellist. He referred to her as 'dum-dum' about twice during my lesson today.

And Mr Song says my cello's got a first-class emergency... that I should send it to Gramercy tomorrow, pronto.

Heightened Tension... Resolution?

2004-08-29T23:38:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: My sis practising Mozart A major concerto next door. Putting on Lalo Cello Concerto to block the noise.

The tension over my practical programme is reaching a climax, with advice pouring in from all sides, especially from mum, whom I'm of course not going to listen to. I swear mum talks too much. I increasingly have to go 'Shut up!' for her to stop talking when I'm desperately trying to make a point. It's her fault I've to be so rude.

Most of the advice however has one central theme: talk to Mrs Seah. Which I'm not so sure works... anymore.

There is... no more safe haven for my mind...
No more safe haven for my soul...
No more safe haven...
No more...
No...
...

I've decided to call her bluff anyway. Banning my piece... is a big joke. It's ridiculous. It's just mind games in the end, to get me to brush up on my piece.

Right.

That's it.

That's what I'll do.

......... stopping to weep at the pointlessness of it all.........

Treason and Trauma

2004-08-25T22:07:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: SENS Transparent Music

Having a real spot of trouble with Mrs Seah over my practical programme... I can't believe it. First she goes out of her way to prevent me doing Kol Nidrei... saying it's standard repertoire... Standard repertoire my big foot... Notice, ladies and gentlemen, that she didn't say anything about Shaun's Beethoven A major or Schumann Phantaisiestucke... now who's playing standard repertoire I ask you?

Then, I have to waste many precious weeks 'exploring the Bruch and the Beethoven'... and something about having to convince her that the Bruch is good enough. Why? Can't she just accept my decision to do Bruch and start with her coaching?

Now she says I sound worse than I did during common test and is threatening to disallow me to offer the Bruch. That is the trauma-inducing part.

At first it sounds ridiculous. In fact, the more I think about it, the more ridiculous it is. It's a week before prelims, and she's disallowing me to offer my main piece, the most substantial piece in my programme? Funny thing is, she seemed quite serious... Said something about an 'agreement' that we made to convince her that the Bruch is good enough... Why? Why do I have to convince her anyway?

'I think I have the right to insist that you do not put up Kol Nidrei', she said. She never heeded my point that I had no other piece to put up, and without the Bruch I had a mere 7 minutes of repertoire. So what if she has the right? She has no conscience...

'To offer the Bruch would be just wasting everybody's time', she said. But to forcibly cut it from my programme would be to condemn me to fail. And what is her aim anyway? 'Judging by the way you sound, you will not get good marks playing it for A levels.' Not that I can get a better mark substituting another piece.

The most deplorable part of it all is, she has no qualms about sending me to my death... I just cannot believe a teacher can harm a student like that. Somewhere, somehow, she must have committed an act against the law.

I'd been brainstorming my options, and I have decided to defy her if she disallows Bruch... It's just wrong to take away my chance just like that.

It's just wrong to make me suffer so much when others have no problems with their repertoire. First Shostakovich, then Bruch... And why is it me and solely me?

It's just wrong to harm a student like that... especially when there is nothing to be gained from it...

It's just... wrong...

......... stopping to weep at the pointlessness of it all.........

Broken Bows, Fingers and Hearts...

2004-08-15T15:55:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Chopin's Ballades (Ashkenazy)

Banged my way through Chopin's Ballade no 1, arguably the most popular one, even more so than no 3... Didn't get very far, stopped at the end of the exposition, after the lyrical melody. There's probably a pianist in me though, he just got suppressed because of a lack of proper instruction.

All mum's fault. And what's she doing wasting time teaching fools. She was teaching one of them lousy girls today, you know the type who are outright music idiots... She told her that her position was dangerous, which was being really kind because she wasn't just dangerous, she was, like, confirmed to fail I tell you... Taking grade 7 when she plays like a grade 4 or 5 student.

My bow broke on Friday the 13th... Ivory piece just pinged out on me and the whole hair fell out... Mr Tan said it was beyond salvation and don't bother sending it for repairs just buy a new one. I'm going to get a Carbondix later. ^^ And by the way my piece wasn't all bad, it was surprisingly good in fact... Miracles do happen...

John Sharpley masterclass on Saturday was very enriching, though Melissa didn't turn up, a bit sad... But she's got prelims tomorrow, poor girl... That's a whole two, no, three weeks before ours. *tsk tsk* ACJC...

Naval Diving Selection: HellHalfDay

2004-08-11T21:34:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: My favourite concerto, Saint-Saens' 5th.

Today was taken up by one thing and only one thing: diving selection at Sembawang Naval Base.

I arrived at Admiralty station at 0730 where this poker-faced guy took attendance, his tag read D K CHEN which I thought could stand for Dao Kia Chen...

Most of the morning was taken up by the medical, which was exceedingly boring... I can't remember details, except that I was put in a 'special group' because I had to take my ECG again. I really hate taking ECGs. They tickle. And I somehow can't relax. Anyway I took a second abnormal ECG, and then a third abnormal ECG. Bwahahahaha. And then tympanogram, spirometry, audiogram, parallelometry, sinogram and cosinometry. (Guess which ones I made up.)

Now listening to: Saint-Saens' 2nd

Medical ended 11-something, next stop was pressure chamber. This was the worst stop of all. Basically they put us in a huge tank, and turned the pressure inside up until it was equivalent to diving to a depth of 10m... Left me with horrible side effects... I'm still feeling sick...

Lunch was provided. And navy food was good. For lunch we had rice with szechuan fish, chicken wing with dried chilli, some (i think it's sweet and sour, can't really remember) spare ribs, spicy cauliflower (not so nice) and yummy tofu soup, the way dad and mum make it.

After lunch was the reeeeeaaally boring part: tests and surveys. Zzzzzz. Hours and hours of shading, shading, shading... Just call me Slim Shady or something... Even the really gorgeous woman who was our invigilator didn't lift the ennui.

Even when Desmond said she was going to take us for swimming later, and that she was going to wear a bikini. (He'd been talking to a friend from the other group who'd taken swimming before their medical.) My imagination was kind of limited at that point because I was starting to have a humongous headache setting in. Probably because of the pressure chamber.

Physical test was probably the most fun part. That was about 4-something, and they tested standing broad bean jump, pull-ups and swimming. I performed excellently on all except the jump, outdoing myself with 8 pull-ups... Perhaps I could have done 10 if not for the gym, swim and soccer yesterday... Bwahahaha. A much-needed injection of energy into an otherwise no-brained day.

Drat, Saint-Saens ended so fast...

Currently listening to: Rococo Variations

Dinner was excellent, yam rice with lots of chicken, some beancurd stick things, tau ki they call it, vegetables, and yummy potato and carrot soup, like the way mum and dad make it. Except that it was lukewarm.

After dinner was interview. That took much shorter than expected: my encounter with the interviewed lasted mere seconds as he asked one question: Are your parents Singaporean? Apparently they didn't want any traitors...

When we left the building it was 715, waited until about 750 for the truck (can you imagine) because there was only one duty driver around... Can you imagine.

First Rehearsal @ Home

2004-08-09T23:02:00.000+08:00

Currently Listening To: The air-conditioner

Lots-of-stuff has happened since I last threw my thoughts in here... Had my very first Querstes Quintet rehearsal, and was worse than I thought... looks like I'm an optimist... what's with Zhaohan and Candice playing together???

I'm somewhat heartbroken that you-know-who (maybe you don't... so much the better) doesn't want me anymore, but that probably means I can flirt a bit more freely...

...and I can't believe how cute Melissa Goh has grown since I last saw her at Phoon Yiew Tien's workshop...

And did I tell you I'm setting up an online aural training course? Yessir...

Hard cheese...

2004-07-28T19:00:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Birds squabbling. (In the evening there are practically thousands of mynahs on the roofs around.) My room fan also makes its presence strongly felt.

Jettisoned the Chaconne... after I found out I beat Edward at his own game by basing the melody almost entirely on Elgar's Salut D'amour. No, the F major part. *grumble* No wonder it sounded familiar.

Went down to ICA Building today, and was surprised at how many people didn't know what it was... It's the former SIR Building! Now stands for Immigration and Citizenship Authority I think...

Which means I'd to skip ensemble, but we rehearse too much for heaven's sake... Anyway I've better things to do with my time... actually blogging doesn't happen to be one of them. But whatever. Of course Cheesy made a lot of noise. And Diane... still doesn't take me seriously, her permanent smile doesn't endear her to me when I've a black cloud over my face... which only increased my determination to do a disappearing act. Gotta face the cheese tomorrow...

Worse, I've been taken out of APM along with Yi Ling, cuz of composition workshop... Oh well at least I get to, uh, impress John Sharpley... But to lose what is possibly my only ever performing opportunity... was something I took rather harshly...

Spirits were taken down a notch further when I received this somewhat scathing email from yahoogroups... don't ask...

Fack Da Presentation...

2004-07-26T22:45:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: The fan... as well as something I'm working on at the moment... a Chaconne for piano and strings. Grr I can't seem to reproduce the main tune which was playing around in my head on the MRT.

Well the sinner struck again today... Kah Chun told me in the morning that Cheesy wants me to check my phone... Well that could naturally mean nothing good, so I decided to ignore it... But just in case, I just switched on my phone in between GP and Physics lecture...

Not a dicky bird.

There was this blood donation drive today, so I went to 3-9 to reschedule my prac with Mrs Seah... thought I wouldn't be able to play if I gave blood... and as luck would have it the sinner caught me... turned out she wanted to check my presentation. Can you imagine? Presentation is at 1510 today and she wants to make changes to it?

Anyway to make a long story short she screwed it up, said something like 'If you have to change, you have to change', what nonsense... Look, my tracks are already carefully cropped and burnt into a CD in order... power to the people... and you expect me to change?

To make a long story shorter, I hit the panic button rushing the changes before lecture...

And to make a long story still shorter, the presentation was godawful... cheesy kept chattering non-stop, interrupting me every few minutes... At least Ken Min rounded off the day with a decent presentation. But he has a scanner.

Hey, I remembered the main tune (see above). Looks like this day isn't a complete fiasco after all.

Franck n Saint Presentation tomorrow...

2004-07-25T20:50:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Saint-Saens Third Concerto (Stern)

"I was once the God of Listening, but I became a mortal...

I was once the God of Commentary, but I fell from that too...

I am now the God of Essay. Some higher being bless that I may hold on to godhood until A levels."

Had a can of Shark Extra after dinner... for those of you who don't know what it is, it's an energy drink, one of the most inexpensive around... because I'll need all the energy I can muster finishing up my presentation for tomorrow...

"Discuss the use of variation principle (and thematic transformation) in the works of French composers in the 19th century." Cheesy threw a red herring in my path suggesting Lalo, as if the bringing back of themes in Symphonie Espagnole could even be considered variations... better to concentrate on Franck Symphonic Variations, just threw out Saint-Saens Fourth Concerto in favour of his Third Concerto, work hard...

I made it!!

2004-07-24T21:51:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Haydn C Major Concerto (Rostropovich)

APM audition went off rather badly, made lots of mistakes and had a frightening number of memory lapses - fingers just kept coming down on the wrong keys. However Ms Ho let me play anyway, said something about the transitions not being smooth...

In fact she seemed to like talking about music, even tho her points are less than salient sometimes... And the Creative Writing Club people kept apologizing for what she said, which I thought was very funny indeed.

This particular recording uses the Benjamin Britten cadenza, sounds really weird...

Mrs Chee Ee Sin, the sinner of all time... cheated me, from now on she shall be known as Mrs Cheat... the Canon was not abridged!!! And during the rehearsal she actually had the guts to say things like 'F# is sharp!' and 'G is flat!' Just wait til i issue a quit threat, like what I did with Chinese Orchestra when the cello leader put me almost right at the back on concert day...

APM Audition Tomorrow!!

2004-07-23T22:11:00.000+08:00

Currently listening to: Elgar Cello Concerto

Afternoon of Poetry and Music... or APM, an annual thing... Last year I couldn't take part because of SNYO. This year I get to play... Brandenburg (abridged, ptui), I think Maple Leaf Rag and *groan* Canon. Yes, the world's cheesiest piece, Pachelbel's Canon, apparently Ms Ho's favourite piece...

In fact I refused to play it, I even told Mrs Chee 'I absolutely refuse to play Canon'... of course had to undergo browbeating by her ('think about poor Toon Li playing solo...' apparently Bev had SNYO and Shaun for some reason asked me to replace him...), eventually relented when she said that it was an abridged version, only about 3 minutes of suffering.

And my piano solo... I may finally get to perform piano in public... It's like a dream come true... What happened was that I bumped into Ms Ho at CityLink Mall HMV and she offered me the chance to play. Chopin's Nocturne in E, op 62 nr 2, my signature piece and the only 29 (for ABRSM) I ever got. Auditions tomorrow, I've to submit a biography as well. Gotta work on that later.

Discovered a wrongly-labelled score at Esplanade yesterday... Rachmaninoff Cello Sonata in G Major. What a laugh.

Renaissance 2004: Mediocre Success

2004-07-20T19:53:00.000+08:00

Attended the RI concert yesterday with sis... let's just say it was a mediocre, or partial, success.

Grieg. Worst Grieg I've ever heard, the woodwinds were, like, gone during Morning, the first screw-up of the entire concert. Horns were terrible. One of them came in wrongly. Cellos can all go to hell (Anitra's Dance - ahem). Ase's Death was the only decent one. Hall of the Mountain King could not sustain the momentum and ended too slow; Mr Sze was frantically pushing the tempo but the bass drum and cymbals were doing their own stuff.

Amateurs. Shoulda put Glinka first.

Bruch. Saved their sorry asses for the first half, Shuxiang was nothing short of fantastic, immense concentration, the 2nd movement was especially well done, impeccable tone. Woodwinds were out of tune though. And in the first movement a wrong note in the horns made it bitonal. Three curtain calls, wanted to give him six actually. I was the last one to stop clapping.

Tchaikovsky. I don't like the piece. Was generally surprisingly good, even the cellos, although they screwed up their solo in the 2nd movement... and the hornplayer did as well, made lots of gagging sounds. In fact the cellos don't seem capable of playing a decent solo, they manhandle the melody whenever they have it. Got kinda sleepy near the end of the 4th movement. I prefer Tchaikovsky's 4th.

Glinka. Think this should have been the first piece, was surprised the cellos could even play... Sometimes it even looked as though they managed to get all the notes. Can you believe the principal cellist was once my junior? Faker if I ever saw one. But then again they all are...

Elgar. Psssh... cellos... what's with cellos and E major? Once transcribed from D they can't play in tune... remember it was the same with Dvorak Serenade...

That same day I had CPSS (computerised pilot selection test) in the afternoon... just say it was an effing waste of time, and that I did really badly for the psychomotor section.

A Challenge to my Musical Knowledge??

2004-07-18T00:27:00.000+08:00

Quotable Quote

"Anyone knows? Not you, you know everything." -Robert Casteels

And so it came to pass that this morning my prodigious musical
knowledge received a slap in the face by a glove when Andris called me
during brunch to ask me this funny question:

"How many pipes does a pipe organ have?"

Of course my first reaction was "Errrrr......" but I guess I admitted
too fast that I don't know, before adding that I think different organs
have different number of pipes, since the number of keys is not
standard. She then said, "Thought you know everything, how come you
don't know?" which I probably took more harshly than I should.

Anyway once I got home I reached for the Concise Oxford, which had a
lengthy article on 'organ' but made no mention of the number of pipes
whatsoever... I discussed the matter with Edward via SMS and he
reckoned the number is non-standard too.

Which reminded me of the Firebird quiz run in the first (and only so
far) issue of the SNYO Times. When Ms Cheong told me I got one question
wrong my first reaction was "Impossible!", then I realized that the
question was poorly set. Serial is not Stravinsky's mature style, it is
his late style... come to think of it, it's not really his style anyway, more like playing around with others' methods, and none of his famous works are serial anyway... what's she playing at?

Which makes me think that if I can't answer a question, there's something wrong with it.

Je tout sais.

All Systems Go!

2004-07-16T16:15:00.000+08:00

Quotable Quote
"There is no such thing as a difficult Mozart." -Wen-Bin Tan

Yes, finally managed to tweak my blog into functioning... So much has happened during this period of inactivity...

...leading the strings in Elgar's Introduction and Allegro for solo quartet (Shimei, Lau, Kath n me) and strings...

... leading the orchestra to bring the house down during Symphony of Expression (da Music Elective Programme concert)...

...falling (temporarily) in love with the beautiful soloist of the Mozart concerto, who cured my allergy towards Mozart... I still don't like him though.

...falling (temporarily) in love with the beautiful timpanist of the TKGS band, who was outstanding on the congas too, really hot shoulder movements...

...performing abysmally this common test, with only one pass and being doomed to lose my top placing for music...

...taking the top prize for the Singapore National Youth Orchestra Composition Competition. My work is to be performed 13 Aug at Asian Civilisations Museum, come and support...

A new beginning...

2004-05-30T16:22:00.000+08:00

D minor: Days ago I blew up my computer [Dies Irae chorus (no, not the Berlioz, the Mozart one)] it was getting infested with hidden spies which wouldn't go away [low rumbling cellos and basses] so I reformatted the hard disk.

Recitative: For some reason, it was an emotional experience.

Everything's up and running now, and I've to quickly pick up HTML to run this blog.

[Side note] I've finally submitted my Querstes Quintet, first 2 movements... I've full confidence of winning, seeing the strength of the opposition [evil laugh] but I'm really pissed with Mrs Wong for extending the deadline, which means I'll be in London when the results come out. Which means dear sis will have to keep a lookout for me. Keep me posted, Sis.

London! The city of great cultural renown...