Just finished a week of lavish spending! Time to get started on saving! But I'm really glad with what I spent them on. Good times with friends I don't get to meet so much, the startings of my personal collection of miniature orchestral scores and a new iPod Touch for my mom's birthday. Really quite satisfied with what I bought and hopefully my pay won't take too long to come in.

My right shoulder's condition is still not good and I still feel pain even though I get through a day without seemingly putting a lot of stress on the right arm or shoulder. I hope this pain does go away soon! I'll lay off playing trombone for a few days and will start conducting with my left arm to give the right shoulder some time to recover.

Alright, time to get through one of my less busy weeks. Goodnight world!

Another concert done! Sorry for not updating the upcoming performances section for this concert! The next one, however, will be in England but I'll still update anyway.

This concert was one that I wished I did so many things better. There were some good moments but overall the whole performance experience felt like it was let down by technical difficulties and sometimes lack of concentration. I just hope we can play better whilst in England. Gonna be a tall order since many things will be unfamiliar to us when we're there but I'll hope for the best nonetheless.

Been doing lots of conducting so far as well. It's really taking a toll on my right shoulder. I'm feeling the pain still. This 2nd stint of covering Mr. Yeo has kinda solidified the thought that taking a full band rehearsal is not my thing. I can get things done but I don't feel satisfaction in what I do when I stand at the podium for 3 hours or so and trying to get many young, seemingly lifeless, people to get going. I've met some really fine young musicians and I'm really happy for them! But I kinda feel teaching isn't so much my forte. I hope to be able to try my hand at teaching privately soon. I have a feeling I'll do better at that than bigger groups.

I just played around with iPhoto and it's really fun and cool! I'm glad it's available for free on my Mac! Gonna be using it more often especially with my upcoming trips! From now, there will be less instant uploads from my phone but more higher quality (hopefully!) pictures. The geotagging is pretty cool too! Editing photos is really simple as well and it does make photos a lot more pleasing to my eyes at least!

Alright, time to get some sleep! Goodnight world!

Finally some time to update my blog. Been quite busy so far with rehearsals and teaching and spending time with people. The Brass Explosion gala concert was really awesome! Somehow 1 year's worth of development in me has softened the "wow" factor in hearing professionals. Nevertheless, I still admire their playing a lot and I hope to be able to hear more!

Next week is going to be really busy week with rehearsals and teaching every single day. At the same time I'm trying to find time to meet my friend arriving from the states. So, German work to revise, teaching to plan and rehearsals to play with a concert on Friday, lots to do!

Alright, some German revision is in order and I need some rest for Slide That's performance tomorrow at Artists Academy. Do come catch it if you're free! Goodbye world!

Back from the final concert of Rite of Spring with OMM. Was a better concert than the first one in my opinion! Great job OMM! Was a really challenging programme. I hope to be able to play bass trombone with an orchestra soon. Playing tenor has been fun so far but I don't want it to take over my bass trombone. I still have about 5.5 weeks left on the 2nd trombone chair in OMM. After that, I intend to move back one seat to the left permanently! Haha! Playing 2nd chair has taught me much about balance, intonation and bridging especially, and I intend to bring all those qualities I learnt to my orchestral bass trombone playing. But nevertheless, I will still continue to enjoy working with OMM for the tour and hopefully there'll be much fun and even more learning involved!

Alright, now time to focus on the solo competition on Monday. Many fantastic players on the list and only 3 prizes. I won't be getting my hopes up to win any of the prizes but I'll aim to play my best of my interpretation with the skills I have. It's also a chance for me to perform the Ewazen concerto in public so that I can better prepare for future performances.

Okie, that's all for now, time for some good rest after 2 concerts and a fantastic post concert reception! Goodnight world!

Back from the final rehearsal of Rite of Spring! Should be quite fun at the concert later!

But I'm quite appalled at something: Many people simply don't understand the function of tuning in an orchestra! The most important and probably the only function of tuning is to get everybody to hear the same A! Nobody (should) care(s) about anything else! Hear the A, play the A if you want to, adjust if needed, finish! Playing Bb is simply stupid and giving excuses for not playing the correct pitch is simply lame! Urgh! So anybody who reads this, please take note!

Ok I need to teach at 10 in the morning so I should get some sleep! Goodnight world!