New Guitarists

Mr. Purvis says that poetic genius occurs in lesser mortals in the form of a few lines per poem. These just popped out of nowhere, really, on the walk back home from Simei MRT. Maybe it was because my legs ached so much I couldn't think straight. Nothing's as annoying as not being able to walk properly.

In this five-starred nation
How coming back is such an export!
I pay my homeland to return home

...and...

I could have worked with worse leaders
But wouldn't it have been less of a chore
If we had talked less and done more?

Okay...so much for the poetic genius. But I was reading Frost notes on the train ride back. Back to being productive, you see. Anyway, it really is something to gain the approval of Purvis. I don't know how exactly he does it, the way he can inspire respect by just standing there. Maybe it's because your sense of personal space evaporates whenever he's nearby...Ah well, but once you realise how he works, it's not too hard to deal with his way of thinking. It's just...different, and I really don't believe it's all that irreconcilable with our views. I think the world's more sympathetic to his philosophical standpoint than he realises, actually.

* * * * *

We met our prospective RJGE J1s today, and boy was it intimidating. The LT was almost full...there were like 90-odd hopefuls there waiting to be briefed. I'm quite sure that some of them weren't told to come down, but just wanted to tag along.

Hai...today could have been better lar. Firstly, the whole exco was late...when I turned up there and found the LT full and sans J2s, I was quite irritated, because that put me in a prominent position that I really couldn't care much for. Hmm...and I think we didn't make a really good impression. There were so many things left out of the briefing, and so many unresolved issues regarding the J1s, that we must have seemed quite lost and ill-prepared. Of course, RJGE is more than what we can tell them, but who can really say that first impressions don't count?

The problem is the sheer size of the prospective new cohort. With 1200+ J1s this year, it's inevitable that we'll have to expand the ensemble. But we can only accomodate so many people, with our current manpower. And even striking out the applicants with no musical background, we still have these 90 people vying for membership. And an impressive number of them have guitar experience. It's like we hit a gold mine, and then discovered that we ran out of dynamite. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.

So, what do we do with such a huge batch? That's one problem. But the most pressing one from my viewpoint is what do we do with the people with no musical background? Because pragmatically speaking, giving them a chance to join RJGE at this juncture would just deepen our accomodation and logistical problems. But then, there's still that awkward fact that we told them during open house that musical background was not required. And to tell them now that we're giving them up because of their lack, which was not a condition to begin with, smacks of hipocrisy. I can appreciate the practical needs, of course, but I really don't think I can bring myself to throw them off just like that. Heck, I got told that one year ago by my seniors, and it was a close thing to get into the ensemble at all at that point of time. It feels...wrong, considering where I come from, to do this to all these people.

Of course, another part of me says that I'm really making too much of a fuss out of this. I mean, really, how many J1s will actually hold it against us? And anyway, telling them now will set them free to join other CCAs, and they need the time to find other places. But there's still the philosophical issue - our seniors faced the same oversubscription problem last year, so why did we not restrict the admission criteria this year? Shouldn't we just give them a chance, after all? Musical knowledge is not directly related to commitment to the RJGE, after all.

Bah...if I didn't need to deal with these admin issues, I'd be a whole lot happier. Has the thought crossed the mind of the powers that be that run this leader-factory, that some people just don't want to lead?

But anyway, in happier news, Take the A Train, one of our SYF pieces, is really fun to play! It's a jazz piece, which earns points with me immediately, and today I switched sections, so now I'm playing chords rather than the rhythm. And jazz chords are really queer...all sorts of strange unheard of combinations. But it's fun nonetheless...I enjoy the challenge of changing chords as fast as possible, keeping to the off-beats of the jazz rhythm. It's safe in the rhythms section, but after a while it does get boring. Heh, and anyway, I always had a partiality towards chords =P What luck that we're playing jazz, and that I could change sections at this juncture!

* * * * *

Going down to VJ finally tomorrow to scout out the stage for which I'm designing the set. Hehheh, it'll be grand to work once again with a proper stage, with proper lighting and space. Though the old RJ's LT1 allowed for intimate actor-audience scenarios, there's something to be said for a traditional, tech-enabled stage with its wood panelling, excellent acoustics and real light and sound system, complete with red curtain =P

pondered by phoenican @ 26.1.05