TJC Symphonic Band

After all that experience in TKBand, I was a little apprehensive about continuing to be a band member when I went to TJ. Yes, it would still be fun and satisfying to continue to make and play music, but will I become, once again, betrayed like before?

Eventually, I decided to put that betrayal thought away. And so, I joined the TJCSB.

I was very welcomed by the band major who knew I had been TK's band major. He tried very hard to coax me into volunteering for some office post in the band, but I declined. I made up my mind that I just wanted to be a simple, ordinary, non-officer bearer member so that all I needed to do was enjoy the music part of things.

My good friend LL, who had also been with me from BPS to TKBand, was 'coerced' into signing up for band. She didn't like it at all but due to the pressure from the school, she had to continue her band life.

I made new friends in the band. Many members were Chinese-speaking people from DHS. I didn't particularly like them because they were like already in a big gang of their own, and didn't seem interested in making new friends. So I kept a distance from this group of rather-Cheena DHS members.

Amongst my closest friends in TJCSB was a St Nicholas girl called DT. She played the saxophone. Another was an ultra-Cheena girl called SQ who played the trombone. Others with whom I became closer were my fellow French Horn Section members - yes, I decided to switch to French Horn because I was tired of the trumpet, TJCSB already had many good trumpeters and I had had no chance to try the French Horn previously!

My French Horn leader in year 1 was a scrawny, hunched-back Taiwanese guy call SM. He was very biased against me - he claimed that my horn-playing was crude because I had played the trumpet before! He gave me a lot of nonsense, including the ultimate sin of damaging my instrument during an outdoor performance at the Istana!

It served him right that he had to stay back one year to take his 'A'-levels. But as luck would have it, he became a classmate in my CG! He skipped many lessons, so outside of band, I also saw him no up!

My other fellow French Horn members were very polite and conscientious members. All but one were very humble, too, and would consult one another about the music whenever they were not so sure about it. The less humble one was a guy who played the violin. Later, when I became the principal French Horn, he became ok, too.

The band major of my batch, called GH, came from the Cheena DHS group. I didn't bother much about them, so I really kept to my resolution to 'just enjoy the music' most of the time. It was only when I became the principal French Horn that I had no choice but to attend some meetings with the committee. At one meeting, I remember that GH was actually surprised to learn from my fellow French Horn members that I had always called them before each practice to remind them about the practice! When asked, I told GH that that was our TK practice, nothing shocking, mah.

LL played the clarinet and found her own clique of band friends in TJCSB. But for lunch during band practices, we still went together to the hawker centre opposite TJ every now and then. DT and SQ would almost always join in, too.

One of the flautists was a girl called XY. XY was always quick to laugh whenever something funny happened during the practices. She is now a very successful business woman running her own expanding medical quipment business.

The trumpeters were aplenty. There was this particular girl from Crescent Girls' School who played the trumpet very, very well. She was D and she had thick, bushy eye-brows which gave her a very distinctive look. During our concerts, D was the trumpet soloist and she never failed us.

In my 1st year in TJCSB, there was a band leader whose name sounded like the moon in mandarin. She played the trombone and sat almost right behind me. One day, she shocked me by telling everyone around us, "Hey, look! LP sits so upright and with her back so straight throughout! Wow, the 1st time I see anyone so discipline and good, leh!"

The tubas were played mainly by big, burly guys. R was one of them. Another was a plump, bespectacled guy called B. B was rather uncouth. Together with a Euphonium guy called L and some other percussionists called BB and DC, B teased me by mis-calling my name all the time. It was rather annoying at first but I left them laughing at their own joke. After some time, they stopped.

TJCSB had a very gentle, elderly man for its conductor. He was Mr Lin. Mr Lin could be quite fun and funny at the same time. He was a real music talent although sometimes he needed our view and input, which I thought was especially good because it gave us the ownership of the music we were playing. I often quite freely shared my views on the music and he always welcomed such discussions.

I remember that for our Competition in the 2nd year, there seemed to be always a hiccup in a one-bar change in tempo in the compulsory piece. And the band always couldn't seem to get it right because all would be hesitant at this point. After a few weeks of frustration, Mr Lin finally held an open discussion and the problem was eventually resolved when I suggested a slight change in the conducting of that bar alone! Mr Lin was truly a very open-minded teacher.

During my time in TJCSB, Mr Lin saw us through 2 Prelude concerts. He was a very conscientious teacher and would perservere in perfecting our music. There was one particular Japanese music score that was especially difficult. This was something about an avalanche in the Snow Mountain. Everyone was tired out after struggling with the piece for several months and we almost wanted to omit it from our repertoire when Mr Lin, once again, held an open discussion about the score. After an extensive session, we finally ironed out the difficulty and the piece was eventually retained in the repertoire for the concert that year. It turned out to be a great success during the concert.

I passed my Grade 7 piano when I was in TJCSB. During my 2nd year, I was preparing for the Grade 8 exam when one day, Mr Lin suddenly invited me to go to his house for practice on his exam-model piano. I was most grateful for his offer and for the pointers he gave me on my playing. But alas, I didn't make the grade for the exam. What a pity.

Mr Lin attended R and my wedding. He was so funny when he stood up, to the applause of all guests at the dinner, as our emcees mentioned that R and I had met at the TJCSB! He must have been very proud of us, hahaha....

About 2-3 years ago, R and I organised a gathering of our friends in TJCSB. Mr Lin also came. We had a great time catching up with one another over dinner at Merchant Court Hotel.

At the end of year 2, the TJCSB went on its performance tour to Taiwan. Everyone was included in the trip and the trip turned out to be an eye-opener for many of us in many ways. For one, it was the 1st time many of us experienced below-10-degrees temperature. For another, it was also the 1st time that we visited Taiwan and got in touch with many like-minded band members of 2 prestigious Taiwanese schools.

During the trip, we stayed at some student hostel which felt more like a resort. We visited many attractions and tried many Taiwanese delicacies. But there were several items which we, the pampered Sg students didn't know how to appreciate. One was the braised pork leg which was served to us at the hostel during dinner one day. Not a single one of us took to the dish and the entire band ended up being chided by our hosts for wasting food!

Another food which I remember was the street-hawker's skewered deep-fried chicken skin. This looked innocently enough amongst some other skewered fishballs, chicken wings etc, but when we bit into the crispy-looking stuff, we got a shock of our lives! Oil instantly oozed out and for me, I almost puked! Yeeee! Deep-fried chicken skin!!

We learnt a lot about Taiwan and of ourselves during the trip. There were aspects of the trip which I didn't like but overall, the trip was a very successful and fruitful one. And to this day, the TJCSB trip to Taiwan has remained an enormous uplift in my post-TK spirits about being a band member.