SYF 2005 Central Judging of Concert Bands (Junior Colleges)

I was at the Singapore Conference Hall for the indoor band competition for the junior colleges. It was pretty nail-biting, as I would get to see all the students from last year's JC Band Festival, see them perform all in a single day.

The set-piece for the junior colleges is Singapore Rhapsody Movement 2, by Jacob de Haan. In order of appearance, these are the songs (choice-pieces) performed by the various junior colleges:-
ACJC - Symphonic Overture (James Barnes)
HCI - Third Symphony - Finale (James Barnes)
NYJC - A Movement For Rosa (Mark Camphouse)
MJC - Invictus - The Unconquered (Philip Sparke)
JJC - Symphonic Dance No. 3 - Fiesta
PJC - Banja Luka (Jan de Haan)
NJC - Amazonia (Jan van der Roost)
VJC - El Camino Real (Alfred Reed)
--Lunchbreak--
TPJC - Gloriosa Movement 3
RJC - Time To Take Back The Knights (Stephen Melillo)
SRJC - Jericho (Bert Appermont)
SAJC - The Merry Widow Selections (Franz Lehar, arranged by Eiji Suzuki)
YJC - Ross Roy (Jacob de Haan)
CJC - With Heart And Voice (David Gillingham)
TJC - Time To Take Back The Knights (Stephen Melillo)
AJC - Vesuvius (Frank Ticheli)

I reached the Conference Hall at about 10.02am, too late to enter the hall, as the first band (Anglo-Chinese Junior College) was already playing. I waited outside, watching ACJC play Symphonic Overture on the TV-screen and over the speakers. The conductor was Dr Lee Tien Tee, President of WASBE Singapore, who also conducts Tampines Junior College band. The volume was impressive, and the brasses sounded very rich. Qi Zhen had told me the day before that he would be playing the baritone-sax, instead of the alto, making it three baritone-sax players. (Samuel then told me later than Qi Zhen was playing the alto-clarinet part on the baritone-sax.)

The ACJC musicians piled out, and Hwa Chong Institution took over the stage. I greeted Qi Zhen, Samuel, Joel (from Mus'Art), Jason, Jithra, Lynn and Arthur (from SWS). I commended them on the sheer volume, and they were pretty glad that it was over, and that they sounded really nice.

HCI sounded quite alright with their rendition of the Finale from Third Symphony. However, it sounded rather messy at certain points, and the solos didn't really project out. Usually Mr Darence Leng is quite particular about these, but I guess the students were too excited, so they forgot about it.

I managed to get a seat when HCI was leaving the stage, and Nanyang Junior College (NYJC)was setting up. I happened to seat with Eileen, Puay Kee, Alexis and other alumni from National Junior College (NJC) band. How nice! :)

NYJC did A Movement for Rosa. Rather nice, but somehow the emotions did not come through, as required by the song. Adrian Chiang (Mus'Art, PhilWinds, SSO) seemed to be rather emotional with his gesticulations during conducting, but somehow the band seemed rather stiff and quite void of emotions. Oh well...

Meridien Junior College was next, under the baton of Ms Sia Swee Suan (conductor for TKGS, CHIJ St Nicholas, Fairfield Methodist, etc). This was MJC's debut at the SYF band competition, and they sounded really nice, playing Invictus - The Unconquered. The dynamics and intonation were pretty good, the tempo was appropriate and all the sections stood out nicely. TJC played this same song two years ago for some Thailand Asian Band Competition. (Thanks, Aloysius! Yeah, Aloysius from TJC-Liszt2003) Hmm... Good song for SYF? I think so! ;)

MJC left the stage and Jurong Junior College took over. Pretty much a minimalist band. 4 trumpets, 3 horns, 1 euphonium, 2 tubas, 2 bass-clarinets, and the rest are woodwinds... If I recall correctly, that is. There were some slips while playing Symphonic Dance No. 3 (Fiesta), but the band was pretty alright, given its enrolment.

Pioneer Junior College was up next, conducted by Ms Chan Peck Suan. As a trumpeter herself, I wasn't too surprised that her trumpet-section was pretty large (ten trumpeters... thanks Julaiha!), including Ethan (from Liszt2004). Banja Luka was one of those 20th-Century experimental pieces, and sections/players have their own solos one after the other, with tutti-bits in between, of course. Nearer to the end, the loud band was supported by three airhorns, waved around by three percussionists! And there was a soprano-sax solo at the end. Oh, Sanjay did it again, with perfect rhythm on the snare-drum, like he did last year during the JC Band Festival. Very impressive, and I was glad that Ms Chan wasn't losing her touch. Her secondary school bands didn't do as well as expected, I heard. Oh well. Probably it was the students, not her. :)

Up next. National Junior College, with Amazonia. Under the baton of A/Prof Ho Hwee Long, I was quite worried that the band would not be able to achieve his tempo. But hey, the introduction was flawless, with the percussion-solos, followed by the bassoon-solo. Very nice. What was more impressive that that? Two of the tubas and the euphoniums used mutes at the beginning of the song! Wow! Tuba-mute and euphonium-mute! Those are not used too often in band-songs, and I bet NJC bought them especially for this SYF. Well, like PJC's Banja Luka, Amazonia had a slow start, building up in tempo, then ends of with a slow tempo once again. And I was glad Prof Ho was very steady with his conducting. :)

Last band before the lunchbreak. Victoria Junior College, conducted by Mr Luk Hoi Yui. I was under Mr Luk when I was back in NTU band. Kinda miss his conducting, really. He's so thorough, and he shares some life-experiences, so that us players will feel with the music, and not play aimless. Yeah, we can learn some good emotion-techniques under Mr Luk. El Camino Real was the choice piece, which was played two years ago by TPJC, who got Silver back then. The long song was trimmed in various places, and I was quite sad that the oboe-solo was cut off, and also most of the fermatas (pauses). Only one pause remained, and that was the last pause between the slow middle-section to the fast ending-section. Good start, good ending. And thank goodness the woodwinds didn't break down with their running notes.

Lunch-break! None for me. I bumped into Adlina, Sinmin (my sisters' juniors from TPJC), Kian Joo (my sister's senior in TPJC, and also my junior in NTU band), Jialing and some other Raffles Winds girls, who were also waiting to get the tickets for the afternoon-session. We all got in the queue, and talked about TPJC band-alumni, WMC, etc. Desmond (clarinet-SL for Mus'Art) appeared, and I asked him to talk to Adlina and Simin, as they were considering joining another band, now that they'd stopped playing for NTU band. Simin was quite convinced, and told me that she would go for the Mus'Art practice this Sunday. Cool! :)

1.30pm, and the tickets were distributed fairly quickly. Us TPJC gang (together with Fumin from Liszt2003, and several of his bandmates) sat in a group together.

2pm, and the second-session of the band-competition commenced. Tampines Junior College (TPJC) was the first band. Conducted by Dr Lee Tien Tee, the band played Movement 3 of Gloriosa. I recognised the timpani-player as the Malay boy I was chaperoning when I brought the Muslim boys to the mosque for Friday prayers during last year's Band Festival. Wow! He was whacking the timpani really hard, but his rhythm was crisp and clear. The bass-trombone girl was rather disappointing during the trio with two trumpets, as she came in a bit late for about two-three bars. I was surprised to see two girls playing on the bassdrum nearer the end of the song, one was playing normally, whereas the other was whacking very hard, like a cannon. Probably it was meant to be a cannon anyway. Hahaha! All in all, the song was very well played. The brasses and woodwinds didn't clash in their volume and entries, so it was quite nice to hear clear transitions and entries. Very refreshing, really.

Raffles Junior College was next, playing Stephen Melillo's Time To Take Back The Knights. The band had been trimmed from the 96-strong band which performed during Play2005 and A Tempo XVI. Powerful start, and very impressive. The brasses were very loud and clear, that it sounded almost like a brass-band. The two pianists were drowned, so we couldn't really hear what they were playing. The woodwinds were drowned partially once in a while, mostly by the tubas playing the tonic-note. The clear tonic-note was very nice, and I wonder why the tubas in other bands sound so weak, compared to RJC. The tempo was very good, and the percussionists were pretty accurate with their cues. The other bands in the concert-hall gaped, and some were saying that RJC would definitely get Gold with Honours. Frankly, I think so too. :) Adlina found the band a bit too loud though. Hahaha! :D But I noted something. RJC spent about 8minutes on the choice-piece, and more than 2 minutes for the set-piece, meaning they exceeded the 10-minute time-limit. Oh no...

Serangoon Junior College was next in line, with the choice-piece Jericho by Bert Appermont. No, not the same Jericho by Morton Gould which was played by Victoria School band, which earned them the Gold with Honours. SRJC's Jericho has a motif typically found in other songs by Bert Appermont. There was use of vocals (shouting, rather), as part of the effects. Interesting. However, I found the song a bit too dry, with minimal changes in musicality.

David Glosz conducted the Saint Andrew's Junior College band next. I was a bit disgusted when some people informed me that Glosz wanted to be known as Mr Honours, as most (if not all) of his bands got the the Gold with Honours award for the SYF. Geez, so complacent. Oh, whatever. His choice-piece was The Merry Widow Selections, which was played by Raffles Institution Military Band for the SYF two years ago, which earned them the Gold award. I liked SAJC's sound. The accents are very clear, and not hidden. The flow was very smooth, and that flow was not really interrupted between the various sections (March to Waltz, etc). Fascinating! The mallet-ensemble played beautifully, supported by the clarinet harmony. In short, I think they played better than RIMB did two years ago. The musicality and musician's maturity was near perfect.

Yishun Junior College performed Ross Roy. Quite a small ensemble, with 2 trumpets, 2 horns, among the rest. However, the trumpets were out-of-tune! Both were flat in tuning, and one was severely flat. Both girls adjusted their trumpets when they had rests, and were rather tuned to each other, but they were still flat, compared to the rest of the band. It didn't help that the trumpets played many melodies for both set-piece and choice-piece. Apparently, the judges actually looked at each other when the band started playing, because of the tuning. Oh boy...

Catholic Junior College did With Heart And Voice next, under the baton of Alvin Seville. It's amusing. I met Alvin earlier in the morning, and I was teasing him if he was performing, and he just laughed. I totally forgot that he was conducting CJC band! Hahaha! The song was quite nice, really. Calm at the beginning, and it built up, as more instruments joined in. There were even instruments which we don't usually see, like crotales, and pitched metal-block (anvil?). I couldn't really see the latter, as it was hidden by the glockenspiel. The brasses and woodwinds blended very well, so there was no excessive blasting. Some people were wondering if CJC would be good enough for Gold. I think Silver or Gold, the latter if the judges were impressed by non-conventional instruments. :)

Temasek Junior College was the second-last band to perform this evening. Conducted by Mr Lim Ah Lek, TJC would be playing Stephen Melillo's Time To Take Back The Knights as well, similar to RJC. One girl behind me commented to her friend that TJC was being suicidal to choose the same song as RJC. I think she was formerly from RJC, as she seemed to look down on TJC. Hmm... Anyway, the song had a very impressive entry, and the pianist was heard very clearly when he played. The basses (tubas) didn't sound very overpowering. Actually, the basses sounded really weak, so the band sound rather top-heavy. The tempo was great as well, like RJC's. I saw that there was a vibraphone part, and it sounded quite nice (a bit soft though). (I wonder if RJC played that part, or perhaps it was played by one of the pianists.) The various entries were near-perfect too. All of a sudden, we heard a very nice glissando on the piano. The Japanese judge looked up, and made some notes on his comment-sheet. The song was completed in about 7 minutes, thus keeping to the 10-minute limit. Well done! Very happy the Liszt students in TJC Band, namely Baowen (Liszt2003), Laura, Inez, Hansel, Clara etc etc. The whole mass of them from Liszt2004. :)

Anderson Junior College was the sixteenth band for this year's line-up, with Vesuvius as their choice-piece. ACJC and NJC played Vesuvius two years ago for the SYF, and both got Gold for it. Could this be a hat-trick? I played Vesuvius with NIE band three years ago, and I was impressed how Frank Ticheli used the various instruments to illustrate the eruptions of Mount Vesuvius. AJC managed to achieve that actually, and I was pretty glad that it sounded nice. Elim was on the timpani again. Yeah, Miss Power-Arms. She played timpani for Liszt2004 last year, and she was really good. Well, she was great for SYF too. Maybe, maybe a Gold eh?

Here are my expected results for the various bands. I didn't classify any band as Gold with Honours, as my predictions for Gold bands included those exceptionally good ones too. In order of appearance:
Gold: ACJC, PJC, NJC, TPJC, RJC, SAJC, CJC, TJC, AJC
Silver: HCI, NYJC, MJC, JJC, VJC, SRJC, CJC
Bronze: YJC

Here are the results, in order of appearance...
ACJC - Gold
HCI - Silver
NYJC - Silver
MJC - Gold
JJC - Silver
PJC - Gold
NJC - Gold with Honours
VJC - Gold
TPJC - Gold
RJC - Gold
SRJC - Silver
SAJC - Gold with Honours - Mr Honours did it...
YJC - Bronze
CJC - Gold
TJC - Gold with Honours
AJC - Silver

SAJC and TJC were chosen to be the presentation-bands for the upcoming WASBE Conference, to be held in Singapore in July. Look out for it!

Congratulations to everyone! Let's not kill each other, yah. Don't kill anybody, for that matter, including the judges, or even me! Let's all have good sportsmanship, and accept the results. Do groom the next batch to prepare well, and expect the unexpected. :)

Next SYF... 2007! One more new JC to join in the line-up. Innova Junior College, located in Woodlands. There's still Millennia Institute, which does not have a band. I wonder if the Principal would ever set up a band there. There are some pretty-good talents there anyway. Besides, MI can be considered a junior college, but offering a three-year course. :)