I’d like to start with a quote from a
recent post by a well accomplished local musician, who is in my top ten list of
musicians as well as in people. “Event organizers think those artists living
abroad or foreign artists are better than Singaporean Artist”
For as much as I know the artist, I think he was more
expressing his disappointment than ranting about a direct complaint. I responded to
the post by stating that for an organizer good better best comes from
popularity levels not mastering an instrument and/or voice. He knows
that of course and I know he knows but in all honesty reading his post got me also
frustrated with the issue, in the musicians' favor, I needed to let it out
someway or another.
Often times event organizers will announce
foreign stars as performing a magical show. There is more truth to it than they
would want you to know. We all know that magicians are able to play their
tricks on eyes and mind because of distractions.
In these "magical shows" it
works the same: awesome dancers like my lovely (FB) friend Francesca, back up
singers with vocal abilities many times over to those of the lead singer, pyrotechnics, they
are all present to distract you from the mediocrity and “professionalism” of
the main star. (In this context professionalism should be translated as lack of
heart, going through the motions, doing a job).
One distraction on top of
another, like make-up on the Mona Lisa covering up cracks in the paint, so it
looks still pristine up close.
“Small time” local artists here cannot
afford that. Because of that there should only be full recognition in how the
local artists expose themselves on small stages like Sing Jazz club. They do
not just play music they lay their emotions bare in front of you.
This was very much evident to me last Friday,
at the performance called Xiao Zar Bo (Crazy Women), a small concert by 4 local female singers performing original compositions
as well as covers.
-On a side note if they would have told
me the covers were originals too, I would not have known, I had never heard
these songs before in my life. It goes to show how unfamiliar I am with the
genres they affiliate with. It was a learning curve and a steep one at that.-
It was a very interesting show, thanks
to those emotions and maybe thanks to the fact that the styles of the different
singers/musicians appeared to me to be very close. The main thing that seemed
to be making a difference was what type of emotion, what part of themselves,
they made most dominant during the show.
At the risk of being verbally attacked
by performers and fans alike, I cannot help myself but putting them
into categories. Please remember, this is what I recognized as the most
dominant in the show and it does not describe the person. I don’t really know
any of them.
Lisa Haryono: Balanced yet romantic
Esther Lowless: Warm with an edge
Kim Eun Hyung: Fun fun fun
Inch Chua: Mature cynic
It was a fantastic show, where I saw
real people do what they really love to do, this includes the many extra
contributors
one even attempted to change gender for the night,
to adopt the spirit of Xiao Zar Bo. I didn't think it was crazy at all.
