The arrangements were as follows. The two pieces we were playing as a string quartet were cannon in D by Pachabel and also The Black Parade by My Chemical Romance, arranged by the vitamin string quartet. For THe Black Parade, it was really difficult becuase we were unable to find scores on the internet, so i ended up having to apply my solfege skills and try to decipher the different parts. We ended up having an arrangement slightly similar to the original and it was also shorter. As for the Cannon in D, we initially practised the original so that it was played smoothly, and then tried adding different arrangement methods so as to make it more interesting. We also had to add dynamics. In the end we had an arrangement that was very different from the classical version, with fermatas and different string playing methods (eg. plucking and bowing and staccato). I also had to conduct them and help with the instructing, because my part was very simple. Problems we had included keeping the tempo and also timing with coming in and getting the notes right. Mitchell also had a problem with reading the key signature, but he practised so it was okay in the end.
The other two performances involved me playing the accoustic guitar and singing the harmony for Paint it Golden by Jason Reev and Colbie Calliat, and Falling slowly by Glen Handsherd. I did a lot of practise by listening to the music clip and singing along. Then apple and I practised in teh music room several times, in front of a few people, and it was very easy to put it all together. Falling slowly with Mitchell was also similar in that we practised individually and then put it together. it was rather last minute, because we realised we would probably need more performances for the day. We only practised once but were able to get everything coordinated easily, with me on the guitar.
Other than that, i also was involved in arranging the performances and emailing Dalat and Tenby about whether they would like to participate in the event. We also invite a few local bands from the shops around batu, but unfortunately none of them got back to us or showed up on the day.
The disappointment was that the SATs test extended for too long and ended up with the string quartet and duets being unperformed, because by the time we arrived in school, everyone had left and they were already packing up.
However, i felt that the preparations were all very good as they helped me improve musically adn to apply what i learnt in theory in practise, especially with sound balance and coordinating group performances.
The second CAS activity that i'll be blogging about would be graduation. As i've mentioned before, I'm on the decoration and audition teams. For the auditions, we really had to be very time conscious. We had a lot of bands turning up on fridays to audition so to accomodate everyone, we ended up having to cut performances short. It also took us a lot of conferencing and smsing in order to decide on our final groups, and these had to be posted on the facebook site. We later then had to arrange music equipment lists so as to be able to take out equipment from school, and also to get permission from Mr. Smith and Ms. Leong. There was some confusion on my part, and i ended up causing Ms.Leong to get very angry, for which i really really apologised and felt guilty for, but in the end we were able to get everything running smoothly. The other thing we organised was the sound checks for the bands, and this also went very well. on the actual night, i was very conscious about the timing, becuase we only had a limited time, and thankfully everything went as planned with no flops, although i did have to run around adjusting things and telling people when they were performing, in a dress and high heels no less.
FOr the decoration team, I helped in making the board for the year 13s to sign their names, and also went with Naima Wei Ling and Rebecca to check on the glasses and the cards. we also make the stickerman for the james bond theme, and i was in charge of picking up the items we ordered from the shop. I also cut out styrofoam letters with Rebecca for the phototaking backdrop. Because of my involvement with the music section, I was unable to help with a lot of the decor on the actualy day, but i did manage to help in some of the table decorations like setting out the cards and the poker chips. i also helped give out the souveniers at night.
Being on the grad committee was really a lot of hard work, but for me, it made the night a lot more enjoyable being able to see everyone satisfied with our work. I really appreciate all the committee members as we all worked very hard and had to cooperate in order to get everything done, and EVERYONE truly pulled their weight in this project. Aside from that, i must say i also learned a lot on organisation skills, as well as finally realising the amount of effort required in order to pull off such social events. i'd like to thank everyone who contributed to this project and also for amount of effort everyone put it. It was a really good night and the energy levels were very high, although the event did leave a lot of us worn out.
