Sometimes, we need to take a break and do something fun. Shane (of Reverie) and I met up at a void deck and jammed (to the amusement and weird stares of passer-bys), and then we did a recording of Sometimes When We Touch on his Macbook. Hope you enjoy it

12 July 2010

Alana wanted to celebrate her son’s first birthday and his progress with hearing aids – how else better to do so than with live string music?

Resonance Quartet played to an audience of mothers and little children, a mix of classical, jazz, tango and broadway, and ended off with a Happy Birthday song with everyone singing along. It was heartwarming to see the cute birthday boy break out into a smile and clap when we finished.

An email from Alana later in the day: “thanks so much for today. Can you send me your standard marketing materials and i will email to my friends -everyone thought you were fabulous. Thanks again, you made the day special.”

We are very happy to have been able to share our music with everyone, especially the kids, too!

23 May 2010

A bunch of girlfriends decided to surprise Jodie, the bride, on her wedding day with violinists performing Pachelbel’s Canon in D for the march-in, and so we did. Wen Jin and I, as Resonance Violin Duo, played the enchanting piece in the quaint Viet Lang restaurant at The Arts House, Singapore, as a jubilant Bryan and radiant Jodie marched in to the guests’ confetti and cheers.

Need some live string music to add a touch of class to your dream wedding, or some glam for your event/function?

We first met when we played for Butterfly Dreams, and a year on, after many rehearsals and recordings amidst our busy individual performing/teaching schedules, we’re proud to say that you can now see and listen to Resonance Quartet in action through our videos on our website www.resonancequartet.com and our YouTube channel.

Resonance Quartet, a string quartet based in Singapore, is open for hire to perform for events such as weddings and functions! Our repertoire includes Classical, Jazz, Tango, Movie/Broadway and Musicals, among others. In addition, our quartet comprises of 2 composers/arrangers who can arrange music of your choice!

To see, hear, and contact us, go to www.resonancequartet.com

Some sample videos (go to our website for more!):

Pachelbel Canon in D – the perennial wedding favourite!

How about some tango? Por Una Cabeza by Carlos Gardel

Up the glam factor with some Broadway/Movie themes – Theme from New York, New York

Add a touch of class with some familiar Classics – Mozart Eine kleine Nachtmusik

Performed for Mayday’s concert back in April as part of string ensemble re: mix. I wasn’t familiar with their songs (Mandarin rock), so I went to take a listen, and surprisingly found myself hooked. On rehearsal night, we went up on stage and found ourselves with a bunch of rather tired-looking guys who rehearsed with us. It was late so I figured the band went back to rest and left some backup guys to rehearse with us. We did a run-through, finished, and were quickly packing up when the guys turned around to face us, bowed and thanked us profusely. We were caught unawares and scampered off the stage. The next day was concert day, and during my free time, I took notice of my crew pass, and stared hard. The faces on the crew pass appeared vaguely familiar.

And I realised that the night before, we were face-to-face with the same bunch of non-assuming guys also known as the Taiwanese superband Mayday.

Mayday worked the crowd well and the enthusiasm was infectious! Was extremely elated to have been part of the performance!

Shane (Reverie) and I playing a couple of songs at a fine restaurant called White Rabbit, at Dempsey in Singapore. A couple of sweet girls engaged us as a surprise for their best friend’s birthday. Handing the birthday girl a bouquet of fresh flowers, we began with a romanticised Happy Brirthday song before serenading them with romantic, jazzy numbers such as Fly Me To The Moon, L.O.V.E., and So Nice. The girls were thrilled – you can hear their giggles! Thanks so much Jasmine, Shihui and Gabrielle for engaging us, taking the videos and sending them to us! We hope you had as much fun as we had!

Happy Birthday and L.O.V.E.

Fly Me To The Moon

And we had a spy cam planted across the restaurant!

So Nice

Almost a year back, I performed as part of a violin-piano duo for my ex-student, Phei Yee’s wedding lunch at InterContinental. A few months ago I finally saw some of the wedding photos posted on Facebook and grabbed a few of them.

I thought I looked like I was in pain, but Xuefen, my pianist, and Phei Yee, the bride thought I was focusing with intensity.

Actually, I think I was squinting hard due to the low light.

Photos taken during rehearsal at Esplanade Recital Studio. Celluloid Concertos was performed on 17 Dec 2009 to a full-house audience. Many thanks to my friends and students for your support! Eagerly awaiting the next re: mix performance.

Many thanks to Fritz Quartet for providing me the opportunity to guest play in, for a wedding at Chijmes Hall on 5 December. Tze Chuan, the first violinist had another engagement so Yaw Chang took over while I filled the second violin post. In one way or another we have all worked together before – in re: mix with Yaw Chang; Max the violist who is my brother; and Johnny the cellist whom we played together in a quartet in the Aberdeen International Youth Festival (2005) in Scotland!

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Also caught them in action at the Esplanade Concourse for their “Celebrate December” performance on 27 December.  In their own words, it was a “subtle” affair, where they played familiar favourites such as “You Raise Me Up”,  “What A Wonderful World” and the intricate Andante Cantabile from Tchaikovsky’s String Quartet no. 1 (brought back memories of the Aberdeen International Youth Festival again where we played this for the chamber music competition). The audience turnout was very good – guess some quiet contemplation was in order after all the shopping/celebrating /feasting madness.

Fritz Quartet official website

Fritz Quartet events blog

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“The string sound (…) was gorgeous as it meandered from one climax to another.” — Straits Times Life!From the great era of the Golden Age of Hollywood, comes some of the most haunting and captivating melodies ever to have graced the silver screen.

Join re:mix, Singapore’s “…hippest crossover group” (Straits Times, 23 Dec 2008), Music-Director/Violin-Solo Foo Say Ming with Singapore piano virtuoso Lim Yan, as they pay tribute to great Hollywood features which centred around the colourful and tumultuous lives of their musician-characters.

With music from the great black-and-white classics as Intermezzo(1939), Dangerous Moonlight (1941) and Humoresque (1946), be transported back to the era of the luminous Ingrid Bergman, Joan Crawford and Leslie Howard:

Intermezzo for Violin and Orchestra
(Heinz Provost)
Warsaw Piano Concerto
(Richard Addinsell)
Tristan and Isolde Fantasy for Violin, Piano, and Orchestra
(Richard Wagner – Franz Waxman)

re: mix also pays special homage to the great actor/violinist Charlie Chaplin in presenting Darius Milhaud’s Le Boeuf Sur Le Toit (The Ox on the Roof) for violin and Orchestra, which was originally composed for one of his silent films Cinéma-fantaisie.

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Spending my Thursday and Sunday nights at the arty-farty Old School atop Mount Sophia to rehearse re: mix’s upcoming performance, Celluloid Concertos. Besides my teacher Mr Foo’s violin solo, we have, arguably Singapore’s busiest piano virtuoso, Lim Yan as well. So what’s with “Celluloid” ? A quick Google “define: Celluloid” search reveals:

• highly flammable substance made from cellulose nitrate and camphor; used in e.g. motion-picture and X-ray film; its use has decreased with the development of nonflammable thermoplastics
• film: a medium that disseminates moving pictures; “theater pieces transferred to celluloid”; “this story would be good cinema”; “film coverage of sporting events”
• artificial as if portrayed in a film; “a novel with flat celluloid characters”
  wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

So, a rather apt title then!

Some of the music were originally written for orchestra and thus re-arranged by our local composers, one of them being Chen Zhangyi who is at Peabody now.

The music is haunting… captivating… and even……. weird….