ANOTHER POST

Another Country , more like Another Post.

It seems like many people talked about Another Country in their blogs this week, but I wanted to share something a bit different, which is my experience on performing arts in Malaysia.


Hands Percussion


This is the first professional performing arts team that I know since secondary school. Before I go into why I know about them, and why I want to share with all of you about them, I'll give a short introduction about them first.


Hands Percussion or known as 手集团 joined the Malaysia performing arts scene in 1997. The way they use different drums and South-East Asia musical instruments in their contemporary theatrical drumming performance is one of the reasons that made them so special. One of the founder, Bernard Goh, is now also the Artist Director of Hands Percussion, is the first batch of student of Mr. Tan Hooi Song (1947-2008), which is the founder of 24 Festive Drumming. He founded Hands Percussion with Eric Ch'ng, and started to travel with Hands internationally and participated in many arts festivals and performing in more than 16 countries. They have full time performers and also part time performers. Every year, they held auditions and provide classes about drumming and performing to people that are interested in what Hands are doing.


Now at this point, it leads to why I know about them. It is because of 24 Festive Drumming.


I joined 24 Festive Drum or known as 廿四节令鼓 in the Form 1 and spent my whole secondary school life crazy about it. Crazy as in sacrificing at least 8am-12am on weekends and at most 8am-8pm on school holidays or before concert. To the point that parents think we are really mad about drumming. I mean who would not think that we're mad because of the long hours under the sun, sweating, bleeding, having bruises and sore body every time after training. This is the physical ones, not until we have arguments, with teammates, with parents, with school authorities, with neighbors that will threaten us with the parang knife every time we're having training at night until 9.30pm.


There are more and more stories and feelings that we have experienced as a team. A team without a coach, a team that will fight together till the end just because all we want is to play drums. I want to share with all of you, because I am proud of it and I feel that I am very lucky that I am able to get to know about Hands Percussion through drumming. It is more than a group of people playing this musical instrument together. It is about 24 drummers move in the same motion, playing the same rhythm at the same speed, immerse yourself in the storyline and character when performing. It is about 24 become 1.


Okay it seems like I dragged to far from what I planned to say about performing arts, but I just really wanted to share about Hands Percussion with all of you. Back to my main point, that is I've watched a few Hands Percussion's concert in KLPAC including,




Ri Yue Chu Yin

• Hands first gamelan concert with The Eight Mallets Percussion from Beijing. 

Souls in Love

• Consists of few pieces about different kind of love, presented in acting, singing, music and of course drumming. 

Knocking....

• A very memorable performance, Boyz Chew with a pile of name cards, and how he immersed into his character. 

Kaleidoscope II

• Hands drumming festival that includes many percussion groups from other countries and also Malaysia's very own BatteryHeadz Percussion 

Tchaikovsky on Gamelan

• Using mainly gamelan to present Tchaikovsky works. Impressive. 

These are just some of the pieces by Hands Percussion, Google about them and watch their Youtube videos and tell me what you think about them. Maybe we can save money and watch them perform live next time.


Me and my never closing conclusion is coming. I wanted to encourage many people to look into new things and give it a try when we can afford the tickets, not the very front rows one, but a clear view from your seat is more than enough. Just like buying cinema tickets, but this is a 3D performance, it's live, it gives you chills, on the spot. Your sensory system reacts before anything else. Try it again. Or think about it again if Another Country is your first experience. You never get that from big screen. You get that when you hear real voices, when you meet the eyes of the performers in this kind of shows. Nevertheless, after Another Country, I think this is a very good experience that I enjoyed very much because for me, it is totally something I didn't expect and didn't know anything about it, unlike performance from Hands Percussion, I can get a rough idea for some of their performances.


Below is of one their promo video about The Next.