these are my memories; precious memories.

Thursday, June 09, 2005
6:17 PM
tired of the excuses.*

hah, i didn't know how right i was on sunday, did i.

busy. the international excuse. well done!

why can't people be more original, like vera's friend, who said, "i have my issues"? gah.

it's been stressful day after stressful day for me.. firstly the tune-in(which we had one week to do and carry out), then the band chalet proposal(which i spent one whole effing day doing), and then the sc trial(which almost killed me.. i almost fainted in front of the band i swear)..

yesterday, i went to school early.. didn't want to see ms yap, so kinda hid in the band room. gah. only me and kwang liang was there.. julian had lessons i think, mag had classes too. ter was sick, so. had combined sectionals with huifen and percussion.. was quite fun. went through les mis, jap graf 4, and irish tune. then, went for lunch with the percussion section(the guys) and kwang liang.. woanrong joined us when we were buying drinks, and we went back to the band room together.. haha.. then, after lunch, was the sc trial.. my hands were really really shaking.. was very nervous.

actually wanted to conduct bar 69 onwards of armenian dances, but chong hui wanted to conduct that part, so i decided to do bars 1 to 30.. then jocelyn would do bars 30 to 69, chong hui would do bars 69 to the slow movement, and grace would do the slow movement till bar 224.

when i went in to tune, i was quite scared, because i had to tune the higher woodwinds.. they're so hard to tune.. i found out that the e flat clar was supposed to tune with the flutes.. how stupid of me. the alto saxes were quite in tune, luckily.. had to do some tuning here and there, but it was rather okay. the flute section though.. oh my god.. i didn't even know whether they were sharp or flat! gah! so i had them tune to hwa ee, who was using a tuner.. phew.. but they were still a little out of tune. the clarnets were okay, asked them to tune to marcus but he was a little shakey, but nevermind. when i tuned them together again, they were in tune for a while, so i stopped before they went out of tune again. then suvenna told me to continue with the armenian dances.

okay, so i didn't go for the first meeting about the sc trial because i was rushing to the tjc concert.. so i didn't know we were supposed to analyse the piece, and also to give the band pointers on playing better. then i tried asking grace, and she was rather vague, so i basically went in there unprepared. i was so scared, but once i started, and once the band played the first note, all the nervousness was gone. the only problem i think was that i didn't look at the band.. but imagine, you bring your hand down and you hear the cymbals, trumpets, playing loudly and grandly.. there's that wonderful feeling.. and at bar 19 too, when the theme from the first few bars comes back again.. just wonderful.. it's hard to describe.. conducted it through once, then did a bit of the running notes, and the triplet demi-semiquavers part, quite interesting. unfortunately i didn't know enough to teach them anything. i don't think i'm in any position to teach them anything right now, anyway.. then went through it twice more, just for the feeling of it.. i still love the feeling of the first note.. so grand, it just blows me away.. everything feels so different when you're standing in front of the band than when you play in the band.. i conducted wrongly at the 3-4 bar.. i conducted it was 4-4, realised the mistake and changed at the last minute.. shit i think i confused my section la.. they came in wrongly and it was all my fault. sheesh. but nevermind. it's the experience that counts, right? =)

since i was the first to finish, i went outside and sat in the little space inbetween the two doors with grace and jocelyn.. listening to chong hui conduct the band.. all of a sudden, there were horn parts i never knew existed! haha! and from where we sat, it sounded quite awful.. no offence to the horn section, but seriously. the offbeats and everything.. and it sounded quite messy when the whole band was playing together. i know i didn't use up my whole 25 minutes because they didn't stop me.. chong hui did, but he said he only managed to conduct 4 pages. in the middle of his conducting he started clapping the timing for the band.. haha. when he came out, jocelyn went in. the three of us sat talking in the small room..

then yogi came into the room.. he had just finished his lessons.. so chong hui told him that dr lee was inside conducting the band(when in fact he wasn't.. haha!). then he asked us why we were outside instead of inside playing, and chong hui said 'dr lee' sent us out because we were talking. then he went on to say that 'dr lee' told us that since we liked to talk so much, he was going to make us conduct the band. i knew what chong hui was doing and i supported him.. haha.. and yogi believed us! haha. when there was a pause in the music, we were kind of scared that he'd hear jocelyn's voice and know we were bluffing, so grace was like, hurry up go in there! and yogi said, "dowan lah later dr lee diao me.." haha! we managed to get him in.. haha i wish i could have seen the look on his face!

jocelyn's part was abit messy too, but i know the dear was very nervous. haha. then grace went in. can't really remember what happened, but azfar came in and we tried the whole 'dr lee is inside' thing again.

haha! at the end of it all, edwin, sujin and suvenna sat and talked to us.. pointed out all our mistakes, which was quite a lot.. haha.. well, it's a good learning experience i guess. went for sectionals, and aidah came to ask for the tee shirt money. ter wasn't around so they automatically expected me to pay for him first.. haha.. and julian conveniently didn't bring any money.. so i had to pay for three people.. and aidah was followed by eileen who was collecting money for acjc concert.. damnit why are we forced to go. darn. anyway. paid up. so i'm feeling rather broke now thanks.

after band, went to play soccer. luckily i brought an extra shirt so i could play. haha! it was quite fun. jun wei decided to smack me with the ball though.. oww.. haha.. but it's okay. it's nice to know he has no qualms about hitting me.. haha! what a stupid thought. edwin kicked the ball over the fence and had to go out and get it.. kenneth was showing off by doing a pull-up on the fence in an attempt to look for the call.. haha so i said jokingly, "why don't you climb over and get the ball?" to my shock he actually started climbing! i had to tell him i was joking before he'd come down.. haha! then we played a while more, then packed up and went home.

a stressful and fun day.

today, i went out with vera to tm.. we met for lunch first, at pastamania.. she wanted to go to spotlight, but it was closed, so we went to dhoby ghaut, ps, to the spotlight there. haha after looking for a long time we managed to find what she wanted.. i also sort of got what i wanted.. two new books.. "school rumble". quite interesting. can't wait for the next books to come out.. but i really wanted "h3 school"! darn.. i only have book one.. i want to finish buying the series, until book five.

came home, had piano lesson.. so what else is new.. this time next weel will be having dinner with some band peeps(hopefully) before the acjc concert.. haha.. i know kaixiang is very excited about the concert right? *nudge* haha..

okie. shall go slack somewhere else now. byebye.

the memories
so dear