On Wednesday night, 26 April, thirteen CIS secondary music students performed live at Singapore’s premier concert venue, the indoor Esplanade Concourse for crowds of tourists, parents, teachers, and the public. They performed at 6.45pm and 7.45pm as part of the Esplanade sponsored programme, ‘In Youthful Company’, in which young performers from local and international schools who were selected from auditions played and/or sang live.

CIS music faculty were invited by Esplanade to audition potential student performers from the Secondary School by submitting video recordings which were considered for live acts. Thirteen grade ten and eleven students auditioned from Mr Kemp’s and my class, acts were submitted to Esplanade for approval, and remarkably all student acts were accepted! Our students were on their way to their first live performance at the Esplanade Concourse, a big accomplishment, which as teachers we were very proud of.

Over the course of March and early April, students fine-tuned their performance pieces, memorised their music and rehearsed together often. Their selections ranged from Bach to Billy Joel which were performed singing, and on Asian and Western instruments. The performance programme is below.

Congratulations to all our participating students on a successful performance to the general public! Their preparation, conduct, and representation of the school at Singapore’s premiere concert venue were stellar!

Here are some comments from student musicians on the challenges and highlights of the public performance:

Amanda Chia, grade 10
“Esplanade was a really cool experience for me and I liked the stage where we performed on. Thank you for this opportunity.”

Tyler Koh, grade 10
“Also, because we have never performed in a public space such as this before, it made it all the more an enjoyable experience.”

Evan Xia, grade 10
“Esplanade performance was a great experience for me because we got to perform with our friends for a more diverse audience.”

Agnes Widjaja, grade 11
“Last night was awesome. I think performing in a place like Esplanade was a great experience for musicians, especially for the ones who are still in school. Because the more people get to perform in renowned theatres, the more they would get to know about themselves as performers, what the audiences like and dislike. In terms of my personal experience, it was nice to see the turnout (due to it being held on a school night). It was also nice to see people enjoying our performances.”

Performance Programme