Ritornello’26 (Wendy’s POV)

We finally concluded the Ritornello concert! Sharlene inspired me to write for this space and here I am, jotting down thoughts and moments from the concert. 

It’s our first full concert as AMKSS Alumni and we have a trumpet section of whopping 14 (+1 sec 4) players! It’s all fun until we had to coordinate the parts, seating, and scores with excel and slides. (Thank you Douglas! Best section rep!)

Reached SCH on the dot at 8.15am (pats on the shoulder because I am perpetually late for work) and some moments later we were whipped onto the stage for rehearsal 

“We will play a bit here and there, we don’t want to do 2 concerts” 

L I A R

It felt like we played 2 concerts :’) 

Thank you all for celebrating our birthdays! Still the same four March babies but heard from Sharlene there are more! 

Concert was on 22 March and my birthday was the day before on 21 March. It means so much to celebrate my big 3 with the people I met when I was 13!

Some cute and funny moments to be penned! 

• Dominic bursting out all the iconic songs we played like Sinfonia, Memories of Friendship, Singapore Flyer, In Swing, Arsenal etc out of pure MUSCLE MEMORY (last but not least our JBF piece Sesame Street)
• When Mr Tan went eMoTioNaL after WHAV we thought he was just panting (from conducting 2 pieces uhhh). That aside Geraldine missed the entire eMoTioNaL speech as if she wasn’t on stage with us.
• Shi Zheng conducted into the sky with an Apple Pen (Apple sponsor when?)
• Joel ended up playing his Les Mis solo backstage for the effect. After the piece ended, he quietly asked me whether it was obvious that he missed a note 😂 
• Ziwei being too eager to switch seats and almost joining the soloists’ acknowledgement post Spirited Away (I think)
• I was left with 2 brain cells towards the end of the concert. When Chloe and I settled into our seats for Queen Medley, we were greeted by a stand WITH NO SCORES. The way we both looked at the empty stand and then at each other with eyes wide open was COMICAL. (That stand was spare, we forgot)
• Also at Queen Medley, Geraldine and I almost gave the piece a remix because we miscounted the rests (1.5 brain cells left at this point) and I think Yan Ling’s video captured it 😬 Look at Geraldine and I getting ready to play while Dom and Xing Ni were chilling behind.

Thank you all for the great memories created! 

Brandon, Joshua and Douglas - the first tankers, thank you for letting us play comfortably and confidently in 2nd and 3rd parts! Joshua is truly the 1st Trumpet MVP HAHA and thank you Douglas for being the best section rep! 

Liang Yun who fed us OCK before and after prac! He even bought a trumpet to practice for this Alumni!!

Joel - the person who is always bringing us together~ Thank you for leading the sectionals, really felt like we were back in time. 

Geraldine - my other half of the Mr Lun fan club, thanks for always laughing at my jokes (i think you are the only person who finds me funny)

Tian Wei who bought the iconic rainbow pencils (which got thrown away by main band, angry me bought more) 

Dom Dom who had to work around his work travel. Your chattiness during full band brought back so much memories, the way you mimicked the flutes at the start of WHAV had me crying

Xing Ni who persisted despite the pain from her braces! Drop your skin care routine please your skin is GLOWING. 

Zi Wei who sweated so much every prac (did it rain?) 

and lastly the three kiddos Sharlene, Chloe and Derek who lowered our average age and brought so much fun to the team. (Chloe finds me scary tho 😢, please explain yourself)

Many thanks to all the alumni who came back and supported us too! I believe some left early and are not captured here.

Till next time~