Ceora, Ola ola !

Ok the title has nothing to do with each other actually .. but since i figured out i haven't blog for some time and that's not because i'm very busy (actually yes i am - been busy trying to climb a mountain with the help of God and gripping on to His words He told me i'll never forget) But i was merely just lazy to update my blog . So many things happened but i refuse to write. Rather write some emails to Grace who's in Macao.. =)

Then i thought just a couple of minutes ago while i was pee-ing (always getting some thoughts and wisdom from the loo since high school.. hahaha) that i must pen this down. This is the moment i'd like to keep in one of my journey of life. Ok here it goes..

The story began when i received the 3 suicidal pieces of my Compulsary Piece APEF 2009 , and they are Rachmaninoff's Prelude In G# minor , Franz Liszt's Dance of The Gnomes , and Tchaikovsky's one of the less known piano pieces for 18 piano pieces. Which i dun even have a clue how does it sound ... Received them couple of weeks ago, and when i saw the scores i had a terrible few sleepless next few nights , not worrying about the arrangement but worrying about which to choose and how to finish practising and even playing one of them in 8 weeks. Then i prayed about it and thought carefully , asked some opinions and decided upon Liszt. Don't ask me why, i just had a hinch for it after talking to Mun Wei and after sight reading all 3 pieces i never looked back.

Then I also made a very painful decision (ok not entirely painful that's over rated but it still is to me a little bit!) to take an emergency 2 months break from jazz classes. Which meant that i had to alter my initial plan (i planned to stop only 2 weeks before the competition day actually) but i guess this is the best decision to take at this point of time. And so , i've stopped lessons with Cher until 10 October is gone and bypass.

Life without practising jazz seriously and going for lessons is miserable man.. .seriuosly... there were times i wanted to just blog about how i could not talk about jazz to my friends (Mun Wei started this stupid

"IGNORING LILY TAN WHENEVER SHE MENTIONS THE WORD JAZZ OR CHER OR ANYBODY RELATING TO JAZZ MUSIC"


trend , and my juniors in Yamaha Academy follow suit... so nobody would enteratain me when it comes to jazz ... and some friends of mine kept warning me to stop practising jazz and even threatened to burn my Charlie Parker Omnibook when i brought it to yamaha the other day when i thought of practising ! There were desperate times i was driving and indulging myself with various jazz music and after each awesome tune i'd scream in the car to myself,

"AHHH I MISS JAZZZZZZ!!!!!!!"

And so i did stop practising the piano for the first 2 weeks to just solely focus on learning my Liszt ... but i could no longer contain it ,so occasionally i'll just open my lead sheets and start playing for my own pleasure.

I've been doing this and i just realized sometimes it takes my displeasure and misery from the APEF campaign away... the past few days has been pathetic , i get moody easily .. agitated and devastated at the simplest and smallest things around me , all restless and bored easily after my electone class , feeling so dissatisfied... i couldn't rationalize what's the reason behind but i do pray about asking God to fill me... i think it's the emptiness inside again. Talk about spiritual downside ,i think this is another time to check myself again. When these things happen , i fall into sin easily... losing temper at people around me , showing moody faces , and feeling immune about practising i just do for the sake of it. I can't really describe it , it's not that i hate or dislike practising the Liszt - it's just i dont know how to describe what's wrong.

And so , back to my point... i sat down just now for 2 hours to play around with jazz.. from my old tunes to the latest ones , i suddenly am gaining more confidence that the same phobia i had the last won't happen again! I used to lose my jazz touch after the NEF last round , and it took me one HARD LONG WORKING MONTH to gain back my touch and feel for jazz... and i was just afraid this will happen again after APEF. But i guess not now.. HOPE so! So i was playing Ceora, a Lee Morgan tune i have been working for MONTHS now.. since my Black Nile days ... and cher didn't allow that to pass ... and so i still play it now and then.

Just when i finished the head, i started my solo ... it started in a very strange melodic line BUT it sounded DAMN GOOD !! hhahahah.... i remember thinking

"Eh what notes did i play? It's not the usual kind of notes i'd go for but it sounds damn good! whatever it is.."

After my first few notes which is my opening motif.. then i thought ok just go on and see what comes out.. and so i went on , with a good feeling .... and the direction seemed great , and by the end of 2 choruses i went back to the head SMILING widely .... after finishing ,i exclaimed to myself

"IT SOUNDS GOOD !!! FINALLY ! CEORA - SOUNDS GOOD !!! "

Eerr at least to me.. hahahaha don't know if i could produce this kind of solo lines again but i now do not dare to try on it again... it was a strange starting but i think because of the unusual notes i chose to start with has taken a different route which resulted in that kind of lines. This was one of those rare moments i played at home and felt good about it... seriously... sadly didn't record it up.


Ola ! Ola ! Just recently C.H and i had this revelation of becoming Spanish... with Andalucian influence...

so , until then... OLA ! OLA !