Sound Lessons :)

The Singapore Polytechnic musical, SuPerstar, exceeded my expectations! :) Admittedly, them expectations initially weren't very high... I was torn between being impressed by their slick marketing brochure, and not-so-impressed by the fact that it didn't seem to present itself as anything more than a celebration of reality TV talent shows. But I was proved wrong about that second part...

First up, kudos to the director-cum-musical director, as well as the scriptwriter. I think they took it beyond "Let's take the talent show and put it into theatre format -- look instant musical!" but in fact managed quite cleverly to bring out several issues about the whole phenomenon of reality TV shows, and reality TV talent shows in particular... For example, the very real possibility of friendships being affected when both friends are in the competition. Plot-wise, there were a couple of parts that I felt could use improvement (the "moment of threat" to the protagonist that might have prevented him from continuing in the competition was just a little too short to be very believable/significant/suspenseful, and the "recovery from the threat" itself was also a bit too hilarious to really be taken seriously), but mostly it ran quite smoothly and was an engaging enough structure to support the songs without falling limp in the intervening bits. As in, I think the non-sung dialogue was pretty good work :)

Speaking of which, the songs were rather well done too. One thing I LOVED about this production was they provided subtitles for the songs on the screen so you could tell what people were really singing!! :D Of course, it would be much better if the all the singers were good enough in articulation so you didn't need subtitles to hear what the song was about, but for a visual-oriented person like me it was very much appreciated indeed :P Not only that, but they printed all the lyrics in the programme booklet so people could keep a copy of it!!! I am very very pleased indeed :) Otherwise, I would have been reduced to frantically copying down lovely phrases in my notebook just so I wouldn't forget them and could blog about them afterwards :P (I decided not to do so here... Because there are just so many i'd clog up my own blog :P Also: copyright issues!) Honestly though, I really think they should take this musical to the public arena and tour it or something. A little cleaning up needs to be done, but I honestly think standard-wise it's at least on par with Godspeed the musical, and that it's the most honest portrayal of the issues of the reality TV talent show phenomenon that doesn't take itself too seriously to be fun. Think about it eh, SP? ;P

Talent-wise, I am very impressed indeed. Of course they were not professional singers, but after having been for Forbidden City recently, I feel that too often people make far too much fuss about a professional singer until they suffer from comparison with their reputation. Therefore I think one must judge each performance based on what you think was done well there and then right before your ears/eyes. There were a couple of really good singers (the actors playing Shelley and Jun Liang), one or two others that seemed to have a reasonable standard with a few moments of ooh-ness (and, sometimes, one or two moments of "ouch"-ness), and most of the others were just having fun :) There's nothing wrong with having fun, and in fact I rather like to watch this kind of fun, but what I'm saying is there was real talent in this musical and not just in terms of singing, either. This is probably the first time I've actually woken up to the fact that "Yah... The orchestra must be super-stressed because they are 'on' all the time, in a manner of speaking... The actors can go backstage and take a breath or two but the orchestra just keeps playing and preparing for the next song and playing!!" Well of course they have a break here and there too like during the dialogue or when a different section of the orchestra is playing or something, but still it seems quite nerve-wracking. Also, I quite liked some of the bits where sound was used as support for the dialogue -- especially the bit where someone played on an electric organ to imitate a ringtone sound :P There was very good use of multimedia -- very good use indeed! I was particularly inspired by the use of photographs of different places being used to indicate setting on a big screen behind... and also all the animation bits which included a spoof of the beginning sequence of the Idol shows :P Oh yes how could I forget the dancing :) I think the choreographer was pretty good, particularly in big-group sequences (of which there were quite a few) -- not spectacular, but the kind of stuff that I involuntarily go "nice!!" at, for example the crossing of two circles of people to become one circle inside the other. But I think the bit that really WOKE me up to the diversity of talents in SP was during one soloist's performance when instead of having background dancers, they had people on roller skates skim around the stage gracefully. Beautiful!!!

Oh yeah and I think President Nathan is a nice warm-hearted man :) He had done the usual VIP thing of going up on stage to take a picture with the whole cast and receive a token of appreciation... Then he actually held out his hand to a young man who was sitting on the floor during the taking of the picture, and pulled him to his feet. Wow! Not only that, he didn't just ceremoniously take the token and leave, but actually spoke to the cast and complimented them and even looked for the director and shook his hand. I was really amazed and I think he deserves great kudos for that :)

Going home in the car, I had an epiphany. You know the song with the chorus that ends:
"If love never
lasts forever, tell me
what's forever for"
And if you really listen to it carefully you'll see that the lyrics actually don't make much sense. I mean I think I know what the songwriter's aiming for, which is the notion that love lasts forever, else there is no use for the word "forever" because love is so integrated with forever, but if you break it down in a logical manner you'll see that it makes no sense because the theoretical concept of "forever" is quite separate from the theoretical concept of "love". Yet because of the tune, and the way the words just seem to fit the tune, and the way the words just sound right in that combination, many people love that song (and that phrase in the song). And if you were to sing it as part of the song you would be more likely to think "Ohh, what a beautiful sentiment/how true to experience/what a moving statement" instead of "This sentence doesn't make sense". So just like my blog title, we can be sharp and precise and be accurate about something, but if the expression doesn't move you, then in my opinion it has failed to be an effective part of communication. One might as well write "you can't understand unless you're in my position" which is probably the closest to absolute accuracy, in terms of describing experience, that you can get. Which is deeply dissatisfying. Sometimes, I feel, we as human beings get too technical about "what's factually right" and forget the emotional aspect of communication. And what, you ask, is the emotional aspect of communication?

Just a few minutes previously, there was this radio talk show on and the guest speaker was some sort of expert on helping children deal with stress -- i.e. talking to parents saying stuff like "You have to recognise your child's emotions; if they are angry at someone they will not be able to focus on their studies" etc etc. It sounded terribly theoretical and I wondered if the expert had really done her research because she sounded like she was presenting a very one-dimensional view of how children experience stress about studies and she kept repeating that point over and over again. (Doesn't this phrase sound like it uses redundant words??) I was just mulling it over with dad and we wondered whether such self-improvement talks were really useful in real life... and then I dug up a thought that seemed to be waiting just below the surface: "Sometimes, it's really more about giving people hope than actually changing their behaviour." And really it seems to make sense. I mean stuff like frivolous chatting -- how can it be of real empirical use to people?? But it is, because regardless of the nonsense content, what is being communicated is actually feelings... And it can be really affirming to receive vibes like "You are a fun person to talk to" or "There are people who care about you" or "You are really witty -- see I'm laughing!", stuff like that. And that actually translates to a better attitude to whatever events come after that chat, a better disposition towards the world and thus higher chance of creating cooperation leading to possibly better output, better emotional health and hence physical health as well (it is proven that mood actually does affect your physical state) and so on. I don't want to make it sound like the elixir of life but I hope you get my point.

To get back to hope: People can't change their behaviour overnight and they may not achieve it in the long-term either, but sometimes all they really need is that little push of hope to help them believe that things can get better and keep them going on in life. And maybe you say that I'm idealistic and that those talks give people false hope instead of real actual change -- but let me ask you, realistically, can anybody who is not you be 100% correct in telling you how to change your behaviour? No. Does that mean that such motivational speakers have no use then? Not at all! They may not be right in analysing the reasons for their experiencing a better life, but they ARE providing an example (and in many cases, quite a few other examples as well) of people who HAVE managed to better their lives and that gives people hope to continue trying to better their lives in various ways. Being realistic will only result in them saying "It's no use, such change only happened to that person and it won't happen to me -- so forget it." In effect, being "realistic" is simply going to depress people, which is why I feel that people in Singapore seem to age so fast, because they're so haggard with hopelessness. "Realistically," they say dolefully, "you are only deluding yourself if you say things will get better, so why hope? Just walk this journey and breathe a sigh of relief when it is over." I say to you, wake up your idea! Things HAVE gotten better, they may not be on an ever-ascending slope but they have gotten better and gotten worse and gotten better so what makes you think things only get worse and worse? Hope helps you believe that "there's something better further on", it helps you strive for the better so even if things aren't perfect they are better and life won't seem like an ardous journey anymore, but one that has at least some measure of enjoyment :) I think hope is a miracle pill.

Let me end by quoting a comment made by a member of the audience that I overheard as we were streaming out of the hall: "Eh, now I want to go and write a song!" I don't know what the director would have felt if he had heard that, but to me that is the one comment that would make it all worthwhile. To know that a work of art, no matter how tediously it came into being and how short-lived its life, had inspired someone else to want to create art themselves, is to me the very essence of being an artist. This is the standard that I strive to be judged by, and one day hope to achieve. I stand by my view that art is the passing on of hope! :)