It has been a full month since my last update. Much has happened. Probably the most important thing is that I've received my enlistment date and that will be 12 September. The very fortunate consequent of that is that I now have full relief that I'll be able to play for AYO 2013!

Right, so NAFA's 75th Anniversary Concert was played on 12 April and boy was it enjoyable! It was a blast, literally, I mean I never expected myself to be playing the excerpt from the 4th movement (Starts at Andante Maestoso) with so much effort! But after all the encouragement to make the sound even bigger, I'm glad people actually like it that way! Comments from rehearsals and the concert itself were really encouraging and I have found a new perspective to play that part. Kudos to everyone for the performance, especially the chorus which did a fantastic job and did the work justice and not forgetting the vocal soloists as well! Here's a picture of the trombone section for the concert [L-R: Edmund Chang (alto), Damian Patti (tenor), Foong Jun Jie (tenor) and me on bass]

This concert also marks the last concert I'll play with the NAFA Orchestra as a student. It has been a great run in the orchestra ever since I played in year 1. I've been fortunate to play lots of great repertoire, among them Brahms 3 (which I'll be playing many more times with AYO), Brahms 2, Wagner's Overture to Die Meistersinger, Rossini's Overture to The Barber of Seville, Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, Schubert 8, Strauss' Vier letzte Lieder, Tchaikovsky's Romeo & Juliet Fantasy Overture, and many others. It was also great to have played with an alto in the section for Brahms 2 and Beethoven 9; it really opens a new sound world that needs tailoring in the section especially with a comparatively larger instrument like the modern bass trombone.

Now, on to a bit of AYO. The schedule of concerts has already been posted on the AYO website but for convenience I'll put it here: after rehearsals from 22 July to 8 August, we travel to Hanoi and play 2 concerts on 10 and 11 Aug, then to Singapore for another 2 concerts on 13 and 14, then to Zhongshan for a concert on 16, followed by Dong Guan on 17, then to Taipei for 2 concerts on 19 and 20, then back to Hong Kong for 3 concerts from 22 to 24, then to Osaka for a concert on 26, then to Kamakura for a concert on 28, then finally 2 concerts in Tokyo on 29 and 30. What a tour it sounds like already! I am really really excited to meet more great musicians, hopefully make wonderful music and basically be away from the comforts of home and do what I love doing. I'll perhaps start brushing up my mandarin (something I've struggled with since young) since about 1/3 of the 98 musicians are from China and more from Taiwan! Definitely should be something worth improving before setting off. Right, now I shall wait for more details to come from AYO and I'll keep this blog posted on new relevant information from the orchestra!

Finally, I'm in the exam period of school and I'm left with just one, my graduation recital! It has been a nice journey leading to this recital and I have enjoyed every moment of preparing for this important performance. It'll be this coming Thursday with details to the right. I hope to see you there! I've created a Facebook event for it: https://www.facebook.com/events/573283402706370/

So that's about it for now! Hope all of you are doing great and I hope you come back soon for more updates from my world!