I'll attempt to keep most of them as succinct as I possibly can since I didn't keep detailed notes or write down my thoughts about some of the events. But as I have a tendency to be quite verbose, I will most likely fail.... but I'll still try. :P I still want to write these posts because this blog serves as a little bit of a diary of events for me too and I would like to remember some of these events. :)
So here goes... first up... Liang Wenfu's concert in Singapore. This was an awesome concert. It was very long too. It started just 5 minutes after 8pm and ended after 1230am the next day. That's like 4 1/2 hours with a 15 min interval in-between. It's seriously the longest concert that I've been too but it was very good too.
For those who don't know, Liang Wenfu is one of the most famous composers in Singapore. There are others of course, like Dick Lee and the Si Song / Wei Song brothers etc, but Liang Wenfu is definitely right up there with them. What makes him different is that Liang Wenfu is considered one of the most important songwriters of the Xinyao music movement in Singapore. Xinyao is like home grown Chinese folk music and has a place in the heart of many Singaporeans, even those who don't normally listen to Chinese music.
I think almost everyone would know this song. The quality isn't very good but the first person who sings it, it's Liang Wenfu.
This year is Liang Wenfu's 35th Anniversary and apparently, according to one of my friends, it's his first ever solo concert. Initially, this was only suppose to be a one day concert on the 11th April, Saturday. But the tickets to that concert sold out in 6 hours. Seriously, not many local composers / singers / celebrities etc can sell out The Star Auditorium in 6 hours. That's slightly more than 5k worth of tickets!!! Because a lot of people lamented that they couldn't get tickets, they decided to open a second day on the 19th April. I was overjoyed and quickly bought two tickets for my mum and I. :) The 10th April concert also sold out in probably under half a day because I checked the ticket availability later that night and it was pretty much all gone.
Because I had already purchased tickets to the Lantis Festival, AAA's live and The Piano Guys concert in Singapore, I had to purchase one of the cheaper tickets for this concert. I was buying two tickets too because I thought I would give my mum a treat. :) This is only her second concert every. The first one I took her to was a more atas kind of concert, it was Tan Dun at the Esplanade which I think I forgot to blog about. :)
I asked for early off from work that day and took my mum to one of our favourite salad places called The Lawn.
After dinner, we went to The Star Theatre at Star Vista to attend Liang Wenfu's concert. The Star Auditorium is a rather nice auditorium and I always hope that Kajiura Yuki or Kalafina will hold a live at either The Star or the Esplanade but chances are if they do come it'll be Scape again or maybe the Hard Rock Auditorium at Sentosa but I really don't know if they'll ever come to Singapore for a one-man live. At this point in time, I think the chances are slim. :(
Anyway, I digress. Liang Wenfu started his concert 5 minutes late which wasn't bad. We were seated in circle 2 which was on the third floor and way at the back but The Star isn't a bad auditorium so we could still see relatively well. Since it's a Xinyao concert, things are usually kept relatively simple so while there was live band and string players and video playback etc, it wasn't a fancy gig by any standards at all.
Liang swore us all to secrecy at the start of the concert because he didn't want his secret guest list to be leaked to the public and spoil the surprise for Day 2 of the live. To be perfectly honest, I'm not really that familiar with most of the Xinyao singers that performed that night. While I know quite a few of Liang's songs, I mostly know the more famous ones only. I have one or two CDs but I can't claim to be his greatest fan. There were lots of people in the audience that day who knew a lot though and they greeted each surprise guest with enthusiastic cheering. A lot of his guest stars flew in from various parts of the world just to perform at his concert. It was kind of amazing.
I heard that Day 2 of his live got Fung Bobo and Kit Chan but we didn't get them on Day 1. But I was okay with it. I enjoyed all the music that night and the singers were all very good. I particularly liked the female singers like Yan Li Ming and Deng Shu Xian but I do have a preference for female voices so I'm bias. :P I was a bit disappointed that Cai Lilian didn't show up though.
I was also happy to see Xu Huan Liang and particularly Jimmy Ye. I'd forgotten about Jimmy Ye but I really liked him too when I was young. This is the song I think I remember him the most for but I don't think it's written by Liang. Maybe it's written by Jimmy Ye himself, I think he wrote some of his own song... I think.
The song I was waiting for though was this song sung by Pan Ying (潘盈) called Rang Ye Qing Qing Ruo Xia (讓夜輕輕落下).
I really love this song and listened to it a lot when I was young. I really don't know why I liked it so much but I did.
I really do have a pretty eclectic taste in music because of my mother who listened to a lot of genres of music. So I grew up listening to Shanghai Jazz, Xinyao, Euro Pop, American Folk, Slow Rock, Disco, Trance, Classical, electronic etc etc. Hahahaha... I will forever be grateful to my mother for exposing me to so many types of music and really widening my world view. :)
Pan Ying sounded soooooooo lovely live. It was the first time that I have heard her live and the the first time that I've heard this song live so it was quite a thrilling moment for me. :)
The last guest star for the night was a bit of a surprise for me. While I was thinking that Pan Ying would be a likely guest star, I didn't think that Joi Tsai would get invited to. WOW! That was quite cool because I also remember the song she sang that night.
This is a cover version of a Japanese song. The first time I heard it, it was sung by Natsukawa Rimi and the title of the song is "Nada Sou sou". It's a great song and Natsukawa sang it really well. I love the original version too. However, Joi Tsai's cover is also really lovely and she sang it really beautifully and Liang's lyrics were really very moving too. It is the song I remember her the most for. Apparently, Liang doesn't like to write lyrics for cover versions but he said he made an exception for Joi. Joi said that when they were looking for a lyricist for this song, they could not find a suitable writer and she suggested Liang's name. Her manager (?) was sceptical that she could get him to do it. So she contacted Liang personally several times and moved him with his sincerity. I've also never heard Joi sing live. She's really good live. Her voice was really very sweet and I'm really happy I heard her live. :)
All in all, I felt it was time and money well spent. It was a good trip down memory lane and my mum was very happy too. :) Let's hope he doesn't wait another 35 years to throw another concert. :)
Now I really regret not watching That Girl in the Pinafore. I must go buy that film and watch it now. It's all about Xinyao. I wonder why I didn't go when it screening in SG. :(
Another lovely classic penned by Liang Wenfu and sung by two of the actors in the film.
And as usual, this turned out to be a way longer post than I intended. LOL!! :) The next one should be shorter... I hope. :P
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