Musically high!

I got through the auditions! I've committed myself into yet another major performance event this year, besides the upcoming Graduation 2006 performance in July and the 2nd DMAT concert in December. Singapore Polytechnic (SP) presents: SuPerstar - The Pop Musical. Singapore Polytechnic is the first polytechnic in Singapore to hold a public-staged, large-scale musical. To be held at the NUS University Cultural Centre on 6 & 7 October 2006, all proceeds from ticket sales go to charity, in aid of the President's Challenge 2006. The VIP might be none other than President S R Nathan.

It's just so exciting to be part of the team of students shortlisted to perform in this musical, be it in singing, dancing, or acting. Professional vocal, dance, and drama training is provided to us free-of-charge by renowned local companies and personalities. A usual day of training begins in the early afternoon with group vocal sessions, followed by dance/drama training and finally an evening jog to keep us in tip-top condition for the physical demands of performing in the musical.

What's a musical without great music? I especially like the songs written for the musical by Mr Jimmy Ye, Artistic Director of the SP Musical, a singer-songwriter who has more than a hundred songs published under EMI Records, and who also happens to be my lecturer.

Looking forward to the months ahead in preparation for the musical...

Labour Day update

OK, this post has got nothing to do with Labour Day a.k.a. May Day nor to-be-mums giving birth in hospitals. Just an update on what's happened these past two weeks of school since school re-opened. The academic workload in general is piling up as usual, with other activities interfering with the otherwise mundane rigour of the timetable. I beg to differ if anyone claims that Year 1 is "chiong" (rushy), Year 2 is slack, and Year 3 is "chiong" again. I believe it's "chiong" all the way.

I foresee assignments not being able to be completed in time - especially with the current state of technical affairs in school. For one thing, the keyboards for classrooms T2025 & T2026 that were supposed to have arrived two weeks ago are nowhere in sight as of the last school day (I suppose they are still at Customs?). How on earth are we going to complete our assignments in time with a deprivation of school facilities? As for the handicap of having no Internet access in T2025, T2026 and T2044, it definitely prevents people from playing online games and surfing porn, but that also means we have one less avenue to back up our data on Hotmail/Gmail/some other web storage service. We now have no choice but to either use a portable hard drive, thumb drive, or CD-R/CD-RWs to store our work.

Musicians we are. Even though our module Performance has officially ended last year, the school's still relying on us to offer our musical services when it comes to their events. Upcoming performances include the Graduation 2006 performance in July, the SP Musical (did I get in?) in October, and the 2nd DMAT concert in December. Rehearsals for these events are resuming - more time taken up when there's multiple events and you're in multiple performance groups. Being a coordinator for the Graduation 2006 performance and the Concert Chairman for the 2nd DMAT concert, I'm not complaining, but I just hope everyone involved in the events will cooperate with whatever's expected of them.

As always, I am unable to remain active in any CCA at all - but it's alright considering that I already have more than enough CCA points. Of course, I don't just join CCAs for CCA points. Being from DMAT, I'm supposed to join a music CCA, as recommended by a lecturer, but I decided against it as I'm currently concentrating on my Grade 5 theory lessons and the improvement of my electone organ performance skills. Better for me to focus on my major instrument first, I feel.

The upcoming weeks are certainly gonna' be exciting ones with all the performances and other activities lined up. I'll update again if there's anything happening. That's it for the Labour Day update.