征服 [conquered]

 

a moment in history. "love is all around" (wen qing man ren jian) fittingly opened the curtains for "the jazzy sounds of teresa teng" in melaka. what a memorable night! 

 

super trio acting like in the poster

the clock was ticking 7:45pm yet the attendance is only 30%. wasn't there supposed to be 1,000 people coming, did they decide not to come? our sponsor, mr edmond, as well as yours truly, was getting a bit jittery. we just can't afford to have only 300 people in a 1000 capacity hall.

slowly and surely, the crowd built up steadily... from 30% to 40%, from 40% to 50%...... at about 8:15pm, the hall was already 80% filled. so we decided to start in another 10 minutes' time and surely the remaining 20% came in steadily..... and ladies and gentlemen, it was a full house at 8:25pm. 1,000 people. biggest ever chinese jazz concert in malaysia, we can safely bet on it.

the curtain raiser is our usual "love is all around" (wen qing man ren jian) but this time winnie is accompanied by pay foong school choir, making it all the more meaningful. to be absolutely frank, winnie, who was nursing a cold, was not in her top. she lost some sparkles in her top octave and she was not as agile on stage as she would like to be, but never mind, no one noticed that except those who have seen her in better days, like our andaman sponsor, who came all the way from kl and watching winnie for the third time in a roll. you are amazing, mrs teoh!

the first half was just good but it would be excellent had winnie not fallen sick. she has further improved on her body movement and gesturing, after a couple of dance classes.

edmond and myself were worried that some audience would leave after the intermission. but fortunately, only a few did and we retained more than 95% full in the 2nd half.

the 2nd half was a totally different story altogether with roger wang opening the curtain with his all-conquering guitar solo "the moon speaks for my heart". roger wang, the roger wang we know, is always perfect, faultless, calm and composed and he won the crowd again in melaka. winnie put her lethargy behind and came out for the 2nd half sounding freshier and livelier. her duet with roger wang on "a thousand words" was worth a million dollar.

another scorcher is her rendition of "i only care for you", which is simply the best in all the 3 concerts of teresa teng so far. unfortunately, the sound system didn't really cater to the back row's crowd, the sound extension didn't go that far as it was a huge hall. we will learned from this experience.  we should have added more speaker in the back rows. apologies to those who sat at the back.

the mass sing-along of "the moon speaks for my heart" was intentional  and the great response was expected so we are not surprised. what we think was the golden moment was when winnie dedicated "goodbye my love" to edmond's late wife, who died in an accident a month ago. winnie's speech was sensitive and touching, without mentioning the wife's name but many people would have guessed. winnie's singing, accompanied by solo piano from cher siang, made many people cried that night, including yours truly who sat at the console at the far end of the hall. it was a moment of true love. winnie's voice has a precious quality of heartfelt emotion and sensitivity, she is a true diva that has fully come of age.

mr. edmond was all relaxed after the show as he thinks we did well to justify the high ticket prices. he thinks our brand of chinese jazz is accessible to the layman on the street as can be seen from the largely appreciative crowd. many of them told us that they love winnie ho.

needless to say, 2v1g CDs were sold out on the night. the CD stall was having such brisk business that we regretted we didn't bring more.

we are grateful to edmond and his team of workers, who really worked hard to make sure that everything was covered. there is so much spirits of camaraderie in edmond's team and we can tell he is such a charismatic leader that commands respect.

we are grateful that melakans are such nice audience, well behaved and appreciative. and to top it all, they can sing well!

we are grateful for everything that  has been given to pop pop music in the year of 2011. we have a fabulous year, especially in the 2nd half. we witnessed the rise of winnie ho and tay cher siang to stardom, we witnessed the growth in supporter base, we witnessed the growth in sponsorship, we witnessed the improvement in production......

we can assure you that in 2012, if the end of the world doesn't come, pop pop music will rule the chinese jazz scene in malaysia with our packed schedule in 2012.


we hope all of you would be a part of this exciting revolutionary movement, never before seen in malaysia!