SYF

Band number one hundred and twenty four.

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Raffles Institution Military Band.

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Gold.

*polite applause*

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Gold. GOLD.

On the 16th of April, 2007, RIMB achieved a Gold in the Singapore Conference Hall, continuing its traditional streak of Golds, clinching its 17th consecutive gold in 34 years. It was a moment of extreme emotional conflict, as when the announcer read, "Raffles Institution Military Band... Gold...", there was polite clapping from the audience, but there were no loud cheers or exclamations from the group of RIMB banders in the front left cluster of seats, yet nobody broke down, nobody looked disappointed.

It took me a while to sort out my feelings then, because I was obsessing over how I SHOULD feel, or how OTHERS would feel if we didn't get at least a Gold. I was trying to calm myself enough to push these thoughts aside, and observe what emotion welled up first when the results were announced.

Of course, if we had gotten a GwH, we would be jumping up and down in joy. But even when we played, we knew it was nearly impossible for that to happen, we knew our standard. So it was interesting to see what happened after that. When "Gold" was announced, I felt immense relief; we did not break the Golden streak set before us by our seniors, we did not do worse than RICO, we did not get Silver.

So it has passed. The storm has gone in a flash. All the buildups, the darkening of the clouds over us, the heated lightning flashing between us sometimes, the blood, sweat, and tears, has climaxed in the 10+ minutes when we played our hearts out. Now, everything is back to normal.

Yet it wasn't our best. We TRIED our best. But we didn't DO our best; the song wasn't played to the best that we could, and everyone knew that in the end.

Yet that is life. We can practice for ages in a homely, familiar environment, then when the real day comes, anything can happen. Life is unpredictable. And that is the factor which alters our showmanship; it all comes down to one single flash point, then the chance is lost forever.

But hey, we did it. We may not have been able to make every crescendo, every octave jump, every emo part, but its the EFFORT that counts. As long as we know we did it, we did it.

On a seperate note, congrats to all our soloists today! You all were great. Sunrise starting was fantastic. Saxaphone soli was good (except for the starting perhaps). Flute/clar harmonic solo was good too. Ocean; piccolo/flutes were on time. Even second flutes, you managed to come in exactly on time and perfectly together. Forgive me if I have neglected anyone.

And also, congrats to everyone else. Soloists may have the greatest pressure and responsibility, but you all played a great part too today. OK, we may not have made all the harmony and all the tempo. But we tried.

As for me... I squeaked FOUR times throughout the whole thing. And played too soft; I was nervous... even though I thought I wasn't going to be. My mouth sort of dried up halfway. Well, I tried too.

Some other interesting little things that happened:

• I met the Balesteir Hill Secondary School Band Drum Major whom I know from church (is it Alvin?), but he didn't see me.
• Our dedicated alumni from just one batch back to twenty batches back came down to support us. Wow.
• My SL gave out the encouraging message cards (which a lot of effort seemed to be put in printing) after SYF... they were supposed to be given before... lolz... but anyway they were touching...
• We did the band cheer twice, unusual, but it was full of spirit. Even the Sec 2s and some shyer Sec 3s joined in the second time. I nearly sprained my wrist.

SYF is over!!! Let's look to tomorrow!!!

On another note, no band for a week... deserved more, but we can't let our standard drop.