I had a rather refreshing, or should I say nostalgic experience today. The band from Canberra Secondary School (I'm guessing its a military band because I spotted a mace) came over to our camp to have a little exchange program, of sorts, with Central Band. They would perform their SYF pieces, we'd share two of our own pieces and then we'd go through their SYF pieces together as a band. It kind of reminded me of how I used to be back in band...young, short, wide-eyed, a brown percussionist. Which leads me to the stereotype easily formed within bands.

The malays commonly find themselves in the percussion section, with a majority of malay boys. They're usually on the drums. Mallet instruments are taken by the girls, though today there was a guy playing the bells and xylophone part.

Woodwinds? Chinese girls. lots of em. Flutes, especially. There was this pretty boy in clarinet who reminded me of Eugene Lim from spf band. The one who got 'beng-ed' (word used in the same sense as zhng-ed). There was this malay guy who was playing the bass clarinet; spoil market.

Tuba. The big ones find themselves in here. What I saw today proves my point. One huge malay guy, a smaller yet much taller indian guy, and another spoiler, a skinny chinese dude.

Trumpets? Well the girls looked loud in character. Probably are. Typical.

Trombones and Euphonium...the rest I suppose? We have the other little fellas with the idiosyncrasies in here, I guess.

French Horn...what can I say? There was only one guy. Couldn't tell much.

Anyway, what I can say about the band is that...damn, it needs a lot of help. During the entire time they were delivering their pieces, I was thinking, either one or all of them are playing a wrong note, or the band is horribly out of tune. I think it was the latter, although Julian managed to find a misprint in the tuba score for a single note which the band's director didn't notice from the start! Imagine the travesty. An outsider pointing out what you should've noticed on your first combine practice. I can't say much about technicality; they're young! They need time, guidance, and most importantly, self motivation to improve, to get better. If they have those, then no doubt they will improve. Directors can only do so much; its ultimately up to the players whether they want to deliver a proper performance or not.

Lin Chow was being his normal godlike intimidating self, standing amongst the percussionists as they were playing, giving pointers. He looked like a giant looking down at the little hobbits. I guess he didn't notice us chuckling away at that spectacle.

They seemed nervous at best. I don't blame them. I was kinda nervous too when it was our turn to play. We shared March "Blue Sky" and Japanese Graffiti X. I was on timpani; damn, I suck on timpani. haha. Well you could imagine the looks on their faces when we were performing. I would have done the same if I was in their shoes. It's just not possible to compare a secondary school band with a band made up of mostly professional musicians.

Took half day today. Don't ask me why...I just felt like it. Nothing to do in the afternoon anyway, so why not?

Anyway, I met Sheryl for dinner at pastamania last night. Had a really good time!! My food kinda went cold though. Was neglecting it amongst all the talking and laughing...by the time I noticed it was so cold and hard I didn't want it anymore. haha. Time really flew. I met her at around 6:45pm but by the time we left it was close to 10pm. I learned a lot talking to her and it really felt good to have someone to confide in and listen wholeheartedly and unconditionally. I'm not one who trusts easily (for those who think I do, think again.), but I know I can trust her completely. Maybe I'll go for ROD this saturday with her, if she'd allow me the honour. haha. THANKS FOR THE 'PORK' bing LOL!! =)

And I'm off....