Announcement
Henderson Secondary School and Bukit Merah Secondary School will merge in January 2017. The merged school will be known as Bukit Merah Secondary School. For information on the merged school, please refer to Bukit Merah Secondary School website at http://www.bukitmerahsec.moe.edu.sg.
Rhapsody and Speech Day: The Last Performace for The Seniors of The Choir (Part 2: Speech Day)
Speech Day came right on the day after Rhapsody which left us with courage to perform even better, however unlike Rhapsody, the audience for Speech Day was a different set of people. With people outside the school instead of our schoolmates, we needed to keep in mind that the audience wouldn't be as supportive as the ones from Rhapsody, so we needed to be more energetic and put on a performance that can gain their support. As we were the last ones to perform for event, we waited in the room we were assigned to. Preparing our costumes and attires to make us look like we were at our best, as well as practicing and warming-up our voices for the performance.
After warming up and taking a rest, we called to the backstage to stand by. We stood behind the stage and watched the prize-giving ceremony, seeing the winners receiving their prizes with pride and happiness made me felt happy for them as well as a sprinkle of jealously, it also encouraged me to give my all to make sure they get to see a good show and also end off their prideful day with smiles.
Finally, it was our turn to perform and how it went by was like a deja vu of what happened on the day of Rhapsody except with more anxiety as the audience is different, and as we were performing the same songs which we performed for Rhapsody, the positive thing we can think about having a different audience was that it won't be so awkward as they won't be listening the same thing as the previous day.
We stepped on the stage and gave our all for the performance and tried our best to gain the audience's support, and after the performance once more we sang the national anthem with pride. After that we had to stand on stage till the audience left. There were people whom came to take photos of us as a whole, that fact became a medium of the support from the audience and this caused to feel that the principal would support us as well.
After the audience left, we were allowed to leave the stage and go back to our assigned rooms. There our teachers gave us a thumbs up for our good work although there were still parts we could improve on but that doesn't matter as the choir will still live on and improve. With the support we gained, I can truly feel that this won't be the last time this choir will be singing with joy and happiness. A few more weeks till us seniors step down, we seniors hold on to our hopes that our juniors would do better than we did in this choir (don't let us down:) and remember WE SING AS ONE).
After warming up and taking a rest, we called to the backstage to stand by. We stood behind the stage and watched the prize-giving ceremony, seeing the winners receiving their prizes with pride and happiness made me felt happy for them as well as a sprinkle of jealously, it also encouraged me to give my all to make sure they get to see a good show and also end off their prideful day with smiles.
Finally, it was our turn to perform and how it went by was like a deja vu of what happened on the day of Rhapsody except with more anxiety as the audience is different, and as we were performing the same songs which we performed for Rhapsody, the positive thing we can think about having a different audience was that it won't be so awkward as they won't be listening the same thing as the previous day.
We stepped on the stage and gave our all for the performance and tried our best to gain the audience's support, and after the performance once more we sang the national anthem with pride. After that we had to stand on stage till the audience left. There were people whom came to take photos of us as a whole, that fact became a medium of the support from the audience and this caused to feel that the principal would support us as well.
After the audience left, we were allowed to leave the stage and go back to our assigned rooms. There our teachers gave us a thumbs up for our good work although there were still parts we could improve on but that doesn't matter as the choir will still live on and improve. With the support we gained, I can truly feel that this won't be the last time this choir will be singing with joy and happiness. A few more weeks till us seniors step down, we seniors hold on to our hopes that our juniors would do better than we did in this choir (don't let us down:) and remember WE SING AS ONE).
Rhapsody and Speech Day: The Last Performace for The Seniors of The Choir (Part 1:Rhapsody)
With the announcement of the merger of Henderson Secondary School and Bukit Merah Secondary School, our excitement for the merger was destroyed when we found out there wasn't a CHOIR there. However, our worries were replaced with determination pretty soon when we were told that our teachers have asked our principal, Mr Simon Lourds to create a choir over at the merged school but of course we needed to show that we were worthy of such a honour and this year's Rhapsody and Speech Day was our last chance to show that we are a CCA that should exist in the merged school.
First came Rhapsody where we did our 2 songs, Rhyme of Life and Count On Me. We were obviously nervous as we had to walk on a red carpet and show off the ourselves, the purpose of this performance was to show case each of the performing arts CCA, and as Choir was the first to walk on the red carpet all eyes were immediately turned to us. Knowing this made us all pretty nervous but we did our best to look cheerful and joyful, and we were taken by surprised by how the audience responded to our appearance, they cheered us on and helped replace our anxiety with courage, it was truly a blessing on our side.
After walking through the elegant red carpet we waited for our turn at the backstage where we tried our best to practice and get ourselves ready, but it wasn't easy as there was limited space at the backstage and to make matters worse there were the instruments from the Concert Band which caused it to be more cramped, and we were even required to give way to the dance girls which made it almost impossible to practice in any way. Before we knew it, it was the choir's turn to perform with our hearts beating some tried their best to keep a calm façade but it quickly faded away as our paltry efforts to keep our hearts from beating like crazy didn't work. When our queue came we wished each another the best of luck and entered the stage with smiles and cheerful faces.
We were greeted with beautiful cheers from the audience, once more the audience saved us from our own anxiety (haha). Our first song was The Rhyme Of Life which was a song that was meant to entertain the audience and give them a good laugh followed by Count On Me which speaks of friendship and give off a cheerful vibe. Later we even sang the national anthem with pride and energy. After the performance, we were extremely elated to know that our principal has praised us and even said that he was impressed, this encouraged us to give an even better performance for Speech Day.
However, of course they were things we could improve on like how we bowed in order to make it look coordinated. And thus we ended off Rhapsody with feelings of satisfaction and happiness, as well as the determination to do better for Speech Day.
First came Rhapsody where we did our 2 songs, Rhyme of Life and Count On Me. We were obviously nervous as we had to walk on a red carpet and show off the ourselves, the purpose of this performance was to show case each of the performing arts CCA, and as Choir was the first to walk on the red carpet all eyes were immediately turned to us. Knowing this made us all pretty nervous but we did our best to look cheerful and joyful, and we were taken by surprised by how the audience responded to our appearance, they cheered us on and helped replace our anxiety with courage, it was truly a blessing on our side.
After walking through the elegant red carpet we waited for our turn at the backstage where we tried our best to practice and get ourselves ready, but it wasn't easy as there was limited space at the backstage and to make matters worse there were the instruments from the Concert Band which caused it to be more cramped, and we were even required to give way to the dance girls which made it almost impossible to practice in any way. Before we knew it, it was the choir's turn to perform with our hearts beating some tried their best to keep a calm façade but it quickly faded away as our paltry efforts to keep our hearts from beating like crazy didn't work. When our queue came we wished each another the best of luck and entered the stage with smiles and cheerful faces.
We were greeted with beautiful cheers from the audience, once more the audience saved us from our own anxiety (haha). Our first song was The Rhyme Of Life which was a song that was meant to entertain the audience and give them a good laugh followed by Count On Me which speaks of friendship and give off a cheerful vibe. Later we even sang the national anthem with pride and energy. After the performance, we were extremely elated to know that our principal has praised us and even said that he was impressed, this encouraged us to give an even better performance for Speech Day.
However, of course they were things we could improve on like how we bowed in order to make it look coordinated. And thus we ended off Rhapsody with feelings of satisfaction and happiness, as well as the determination to do better for Speech Day.
NUSS Singathon 2015
It's that time of the year again where we go to NUSS for the Singathon this year.
Watching the cute little primary school students sing made us excited to sing as well however, we felt nervous (especially the guys) and as a result we messed up on stage as some of us forgotten our parts:( That left some of the guys worried that our choir instructor, Mr Adyll might reprimand us for our mistake. A decision was then made to allow the primary school choirs to go first, as they had to go back to school early for whatever reason it maybe. After this, it was breaktime for us. Afterwards, we played games like treasure hunting which we did during our lunch break and it was very fun as we had to sing 'Home' and record it as one of the tasks. Finally we ended the day with the NUSS choir singing a song for us and also a sing-along with the rest of the choirs and it was home sweet home for us. I hope the mistake the choir did during the performance would help as a wake-up call for all of us (especially the boys haha)despite Mr Adyll remaining silent even after the performance.
Watching the cute little primary school students sing made us excited to sing as well however, we felt nervous (especially the guys) and as a result we messed up on stage as some of us forgotten our parts:( That left some of the guys worried that our choir instructor, Mr Adyll might reprimand us for our mistake. A decision was then made to allow the primary school choirs to go first, as they had to go back to school early for whatever reason it maybe. After this, it was breaktime for us. Afterwards, we played games like treasure hunting which we did during our lunch break and it was very fun as we had to sing 'Home' and record it as one of the tasks. Finally we ended the day with the NUSS choir singing a song for us and also a sing-along with the rest of the choirs and it was home sweet home for us. I hope the mistake the choir did during the performance would help as a wake-up call for all of us (especially the boys haha)despite Mr Adyll remaining silent even after the performance.
VIA activity at Appleland childcare
Exam finally over:) And CCA has finally started again
However our Teachers feared that we might not have enough VIA hours and decided to arrange a VIA activity for the choir to take part in:)
The Teachers even got us a place for our activity named Appleland childcare
We then split the choir into 3 groups one for logistics, arts and crafts and music
The ones in charge of music decided on Christmas songs to teach the children there while the logistics were in charge of getting the materials while the arts and crafts will use the materials to make their artistic creations
Each member of the Choir was assigned to one child each and we did activities to remember each other's names and even made bottles which have beans, rice and confetti in them
We then sang Jingle Bells and Santa Claus is Coming to town to the children and taught them how to sing
The activity ended with our goodbyes to the cute little children though, we still miss them:( The teachers were also kind enough to get us bread and biscuits to keep us from starving and we were very appreciative of them
Speech Day: An explosive preformance and a redundant technical difficulty
Speech Day came early on this April on the 11th. Treating it like a early final draft of how our SYF would look like, we performed with enthusiasm and putting on some smiles and thankfully remembering our stage positions with precisions that seemed to be eerily too precise and contradicting to my stage fright but nevertheless it was a good and impressive performance, earning
our conductor Mr Adyll, two thumbs up from Ms Faith our ex-CCA teacher who watched the performance. It turned out that halfway during our performance, the mice for the tanner-bases side malfunctioned and did not project our voices however it did not matter nor did it caused any problem hearing and harmonising.Our seniors and ex-choir members were also happy and liked how we sounded. Thank you so much for Amanda, Maddy and our other beloved seniors for watching us grow and see us perform. Having seen how well we have improved we were surely encouraged to improve more for the two weeks before our SYF.-K
SYF '15: One Voice,Three Songs, One blast of a performance
Last Monday, after approximately six months of practices, it was time to unleash our hard work and training to five to seven professional judges and an audience consisting of our own teachers, other school choirs and their conductors in the form of three songs which were all in foreign languages hand-picked by our own conductor Mr Adyll. Through practices and meet- ups with three musically trained professionals, we were able to improve and get better in six months. Six months of hard work
and sometimes even sometimes some arguments and friction here and there but we stuck together as on choir family and one voice. With the help of Mr Kentaro Sato and Mr Jude who were both composers, we were able to convey more sincere emotions that were relevant to the specific songs for example "Tinig ng Maralita" which was a song in Tagalog and was regarding the desperate conditions in the Philippines and the even miserable lives of the poor children who live off scrap food in the streets.
Six months after these practice, it was time. Time to sign. Time to see how far we have come. Arriving in SOTA at about 2:30pm after practicing from 11pm the same day, we were excited and anxious, eager yet terrified to the bone. However, we striped ourselves with all of our problems and fears and as Mr Adyll emphasised, we kept our eyes on him and performed and not only sing. I remember Mr Adyll saying that he wanted us not only to sing but to perform and that there is difference between a choir singing and a choir performing. We in my opinion performed what we could, placed our focus and sang on. After about ten minutes of singing I mean I should say performing our hearts out, we were left relieved having performed really well. I asked Mrs Ng our fellow choir CCA teacher what she thought of our performance she distinctly said that we were very invested to Mr Adyll, putting all our attention to him. We then left SOTA feeling upbeat and on a overall happy note. Later this week Wednesday we were greeted with great joy having founded out we attained a certificate of accomplishment (COA/Silver). From a bronze to a silver from 2013 to 2015 , we have improved tremendously and I am personally proud of our great efforts and I am proud of you Choir good job! I hope we will continue to grow and bond together, singing on as time continues-K PS: The ladies are wearing a revamped classic costume that re uses an old costume but introduces a crimson velvet red band on the waist instead of a blue one.
Six months after these practice, it was time. Time to sign. Time to see how far we have come. Arriving in SOTA at about 2:30pm after practicing from 11pm the same day, we were excited and anxious, eager yet terrified to the bone. However, we striped ourselves with all of our problems and fears and as Mr Adyll emphasised, we kept our eyes on him and performed and not only sing. I remember Mr Adyll saying that he wanted us not only to sing but to perform and that there is difference between a choir singing and a choir performing. We in my opinion performed what we could, placed our focus and sang on. After about ten minutes of singing I mean I should say performing our hearts out, we were left relieved having performed really well. I asked Mrs Ng our fellow choir CCA teacher what she thought of our performance she distinctly said that we were very invested to Mr Adyll, putting all our attention to him. We then left SOTA feeling upbeat and on a overall happy note. Later this week Wednesday we were greeted with great joy having founded out we attained a certificate of accomplishment (COA/Silver). From a bronze to a silver from 2013 to 2015 , we have improved tremendously and I am personally proud of our great efforts and I am proud of you Choir good job! I hope we will continue to grow and bond together, singing on as time continues-K PS: The ladies are wearing a revamped classic costume that re uses an old costume but introduces a crimson velvet red band on the waist instead of a blue one.
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| Our pianist, Ms Iddi with our Ladies |
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| WooHOO! |
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| Well done HSS Choir |
A New Year: Time to show off our talents :D
Early on this year, the time came to again prop up an awesome booth in the hall as part of the annual CCA try-out mini convention held for the new batch Hendersonians. And for the second time, we were given just two boards to prop and design our booth, luckily with some pleading we were able to getaway with another board to hang two of our choir concert and SYF costumes(one for the guys and one for the ladies(still the infamous banana-yellow shade)).
We reused our board we made last year for the same event and placed a bowl of sweets to entice some curious bystanders and as a new and genius addition, our fellow choir members suggested performing with a guitar to give the sec one's some Choir Power, singing some popular music. Overall a great boost in new additions of Choiristers resulted with the help of this successful CCA try-out event. Thanks to Aurelia,Jobel,Jeremy,Kira ,Mun and Theresia and our sweetly beloved senior and ex-president Maddy for dropping by and helping in the building of our booth.Also thanks to our choir memebers who lent their choir costumes for thus event!-K
We reused our board we made last year for the same event and placed a bowl of sweets to entice some curious bystanders and as a new and genius addition, our fellow choir members suggested performing with a guitar to give the sec one's some Choir Power, singing some popular music. Overall a great boost in new additions of Choiristers resulted with the help of this successful CCA try-out event. Thanks to Aurelia,Jobel,Jeremy,Kira ,Mun and Theresia and our sweetly beloved senior and ex-president Maddy for dropping by and helping in the building of our booth.Also thanks to our choir memebers who lent their choir costumes for thus event!-K
Hey Punggol!:Practices,Punggolerson,Japanese and Harry Potter
November practices!! Holiday practices are a staple in this choir, especially when our SYF is creeping nearer and nearer, we are doing are best to keep training and becoming much more stronger and bonded in voice and as group in general. As we trained and sang our selected songs we also had the chance to be part of Mr Sato Sans'(world-renowned composer) concert as part of a performance with Punggol Secondary Choir. As Preparation for the concert, we had two trips to Punggol to have sessions with their Choir, who were very friendly and welcoming and in the course of two days we already made some lasting friends. Not only were they great people, they were also awesome singers and surprisingly we could blend easily well and after a short course of time we already sounded like one, solid voice. At the last hour of each session, we had short discussion and practice with Mr Sato San himself and he was such an energetic and child at heart individual who knew when something was not right and really easy to follow.
Mr Sato San was and is known for his work such as Mae-e which is about the lost of people during the 2011 earthquake in Japan. He trained as with passion and was really friendly, he helped plan our formation during performances and taught some hand gestures that would be followed as a sign during our performance. He compared the harry potter books and films as an example to show that it is difficult to show or evoke emotions especially when they are just written. He said that the first three films were amazing,on-point but as the films continued to come somethings were a bit muddled and confused thus overall he said he enjoyed the literature much more:)
On the day of the performance itself, we met very early just in case and went up to our seats. We were quite anxious but it went pretty well and seeing the video it was not bad. There were also other choirs who were also part of a two-part performance, and like the NUSS singathon, there were cute primary school angels and teenagers of our age that sang their hearts out. There were some scuffles here and there but no road is made of smooth cement:) and as the we board the bus onwards endless tunnels, seas away from Henderson, we have surely learnt great things that night have made great experiences to remember oh and plus we got to meet Ms Iddi our Standby conductor and amazing pianist.
Credit: Thank you for Mdm Maizal for those amazing pastries and Mrs Pang and Mrs Ng for the old Chang Kee order for lunch on the exchange session days:D
Mr Sato San was and is known for his work such as Mae-e which is about the lost of people during the 2011 earthquake in Japan. He trained as with passion and was really friendly, he helped plan our formation during performances and taught some hand gestures that would be followed as a sign during our performance. He compared the harry potter books and films as an example to show that it is difficult to show or evoke emotions especially when they are just written. He said that the first three films were amazing,on-point but as the films continued to come somethings were a bit muddled and confused thus overall he said he enjoyed the literature much more:)
On the day of the performance itself, we met very early just in case and went up to our seats. We were quite anxious but it went pretty well and seeing the video it was not bad. There were also other choirs who were also part of a two-part performance, and like the NUSS singathon, there were cute primary school angels and teenagers of our age that sang their hearts out. There were some scuffles here and there but no road is made of smooth cement:) and as the we board the bus onwards endless tunnels, seas away from Henderson, we have surely learnt great things that night have made great experiences to remember oh and plus we got to meet Ms Iddi our Standby conductor and amazing pianist.
Credit: Thank you for Mdm Maizal for those amazing pastries and Mrs Pang and Mrs Ng for the old Chang Kee order for lunch on the exchange session days:D
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| Rest |
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| Thanks Mdm Miazal for lunch! |
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| Sunset |
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| Mr Sato San |
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| Rehearsals |
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| Together Punggolereson :D |
On Air with the Graduate singers,propsals and heaven
Wow what night that was! Also in October, we had the chance to see our conductor again performing his choir just like last year with the SOTA concert, this year we went to raffles place to watch his concert at the newly renovated Victoria Concert Hall. We were greeted with a pearl white hall and alone there in the stage sat a cute little stool with a little radio on top, and as we settled down, the radio began to erupt in static, before a host introduce himself as the night's MC , it was really refreshing and creative, just how we like it. The MC then began explaining the purpose and meaning behind the concert, which was to give the feeling of being in the older generation, listening to the radio much more often and being entertained through your ears and a delight of the senses. It felt like church, heavenly and dream-like. During the performance, lights were incorporated along with mirror-like glass that made this kaleidoscope look that was just so eerie and used so beautifully.
The songs were of many tongues such as Latin and even my language :D (Tagalog), also even none! There was this song they played that was composed by a Norwegian man that just contained these rhythms and sounds that was very dub step and modern and a delight to the ears also the song was done with light on each of the fingers of the choirs members and were separated in different colours and as the different sections did their own tunes each did different waves and gesture and it look very much like when a sound studio is recording and you would see the different graph-like waves moving up and down in different colours. The last song was also very touching and dramatic it contained a percussion band to help set the mood plus two amazing ballet dancers who acted out a abstract scene of love and elegance. Wait! There is more. As the presumed last song ended, another one started and got us by surprise as we were ready to get up but this man who I assume was also a choir member sang as he went to wards the stage, singing an old pop song, and sounded very tired and was catching his breath when he went up the stage and held up a woman's, also a member, hand and he then dance with her and as the song ended, he then said will you marry me? It was so romantic!! She then replied,"yes!",and they hugged and we were so speechless, I wish we could have taken pictures of it but*sigh*, that was unexpected and Mr Adyll then made a speech thanking the audience and the choir and the organizers.
In conclusion, we had a great night and some things we have learnt were how professional these people were as they sang and they were quite a small group and they still sang as loud, maybe even louder than how we do even now! This has been an amazing experience seeing our conductor in action!-K
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| Tickets |
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| church-like setting, notice the greatly detailed pillars:D |
Revamping the notice board:Making memories,remembering old ones
In October, we finally revamped our notice board along the level one corridor, making spaces for more memories and taking out the old ones. Among the scraps of dog-eared paper, photos of our seniors and ex- choir conductor Mr Lim were pinned along with scraps of paper describing past events.Wow felt like a century since those training sessions for the SYF in the year of 2013!If our seniors disappeared from the pictures, there would be about five or six of us there, that's how influential you were:)Well it is time to make new memories and remember the old ones. With the help of our juniors and art, we rebuild the board from scratch, and revamping the design overall. WE decided to keep some of the yellow bird "chibi" cut outs our seniors did haha but the background was all new and was made from coloured paper and we decided to use a rainbow stripe like design, you cant have enough colours :D and like a rainbow all of us count to make one choir, one voice.-K |
| Making a mess |
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| all the good memories,goodbye,making space for more |
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| Mun(secretary) and Kira(president) applying the final touches |
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| Choiristers planning |
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| Finished |
NUSS Singathon '14: Fresh air and stage frights
Ah here is our latest adventure out of our choir room! Fresh air and stage fright haha but we had so much fun eating(there was a buffet that day)um I mean singing and taking a look at some amazing choirs. Indeed age doesn't matter as choirs of all forms and sizes came from cute primary school singers to our own Senior citizens singing(NUSS choir conducted by our very own conductor, Mr Adyll).
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And it being our second time performing, we spiced things up by performing an acoustic version of Roar by Katy Perry with our talented choir members playing the guitar. We had a great and fun experience overall and were inspired by the skills of the many choirs that came that day ,being a senior of this choir, I hope HSS Choiristers shall cherish and preserve this tradition for more to come-K
Gardens near the City
What fun a time we had! Some of our fellow Choiristers had the chance to go to Gardens By The Bay for an art festival, We were able to check out very talented groups of performers such as Choirs(including very cute, baby faced little primary school angels who sang so sweetfully inside the flower dome), Orchestral Bands, singers and violinists among many. Plus there were art booths and games and food stalls. One booth which its name is still imprinted in my mind was called Henna Montana. Get it? Because its a henna booth and henna sounds like" Hanna" the show that stared the now much more famous Miley Cyrus, oh never mind.
Overall we had a great time exploring the vast gardens, my favourite one was the cloud forest as shown below, with its many waterfalls and humid environment it really felt very tropical and exotic. The other performing art groups from our school also came and we are very thankful for the saint John members who dedicated their time in ensuring that we have a safe trip and indeed we did, oh and I even brought back a souvenir, a baby hybrid Bornean pitcher plant that then withered and disappeared into oblivion.-K
Bow down to your new masters!!! HeHeHe(evil laugh)
Welcoming the new Choir committee of 2014-2015! Excited and scared are we to guide are juniors for a year and a half. We hope to uphold a good standard and values and we seek your support and respect as we do our respective responsibilities in making our choir an exceptional one ;D
Auld Lang Syne
Appreciation lunch for the seniors :)
And small gift from the choir to each of the sec 4/5s
and another group photo with the seniors and those yummy Pizzas(thank you Ms Faith he he)
Seniors you were(and are) our friend and leaders,thank you for aspiring a new generation of awesome singers. We will always sing as ONE.;) -K and junior minion reporter
And small gift from the choir to each of the sec 4/5s
and another group photo with the seniors and those yummy Pizzas(thank you Ms Faith he he)
Seniors you were(and are) our friend and leaders,thank you for aspiring a new generation of awesome singers. We will always sing as ONE.;) -K and junior minion reporter
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