Wahahaha.... went for the Distant Worlds concert at the Esplanade!! Yiiiippppeeeee!!!! (dun worry Xiu, I've bought the CD for ye to listen! Packed with lotsa Nobuo goodnessss~~ XD) Let's see..where to start from...
Ticketing troubles
First started off with wanting to buy tix... for the Friday show. Hui Ling told me about the high possibility of Nobuo gracing the first concert of the Asian Premiere. Tix were selling damn fast... on the third day, many of the good seats were sold out and the cheaper ones were kind of in a half gone stage. >_< I was waiting for the student discount then, but nevermind... just went to the sistic outlet in Jurong Point and grabbed two, one for myself and another for Huiying, who gladly agreed to accompany me to the concert. Kept asking Alton if he wanted to go too, cos he was pretty interested in FF music, gave me a whole bunch of it to listen to T_T... I intended to buy a tix for him as a bdae pressie (cos just can't think of anything else...), but wondered if he could make time for it and if HY wouldn't mind me dragging a stranger along. By the time both parties are ok with my intentions, the tix for both days were gone... Sad... but surprisingly, another slot opened for Saturday. Grabbed the chance and got two tix again... ah well. Dun mind watching it again, besides, it's student discount this round, a lot more discount than the previous buy.
First day! 22nd May 09
View from my seating!
There was a very very high atmosphere in the concert hall... >_< Seats all taken up, and the audience were very eager to cheer and applaude. When Arnie Roth (the conducter) took stage and made welcome speeches, there were applause every where, and even before the mention of Nobuo Uematsu's name, someone in the audience just burst out screaming Uematsu sensei's name (a guy... super hyper). Of course, applause there immediately, and Uematsu sensei just rose from his seat (WEEEEEE~~~ he's just 3 rows behind me, a few seats away >_< faint ar...) The ojisan was really all cheerful and smily, wearing some beige jap clothing and slippers, with a bandana covering the head. The conductor seemed pretty tight before that, but at the sight of the super enthusiastic audience, he seemed to loosen up "oh yes, Nobuo Uematsu san, we're all here to fall on our knees and worship him tonight!" XDXDXD For once, I felt super hyped up about the concert.
And so the fun starts! Liberi Fatali was nice, but from my seat, the sopranos was quite drowned by the violins... Oh yea, there was a guy who takes charge of the tuning at the start of the concert, dunno who but he reminded me of Tony Leung (due to his eyes and brows..), the way he played the violin was really good... >_< you can see that he was enjoying what he was doing there. That aside, 'To Zarnarkand' quite gave me the chills... (Too bad they dun have that track in the CD...sob sob.) Maybe the video, which showed Yuna's dance for the dead souls, was very impactful... Oh yea, the music was very in synch with the video too, there was applause when the next song 'Don't Be Afraid' (FFVIII Battle theme) started, cos the timing was super good. The video was showing the start of the fighting scene in FFVIII, and the conductor came in just right, exactly as if you were playing the game (adding the applause and screams right after the start... whao... Just gotta love the atmosphere.... XD)
Went on and on, and the next thing which was super cute and unexpected... the guitarist who performed for the songs 'Dear Friends (FFV)' and 'Vamo' alla Flamenco (FFIX)' forgot his handphone underneath the music scores on the stand he was using during the performance ! >_< And it rang halfway throguh the song after 'Vamo' alla Flamenco'!! >_< It was pretty hilarious, a break from the serious tone of the song 'Ronfaure'. Since I was only 3 rows away from the stage, I could hear the faint 'ring ring', and the 'Tong Leung' tuner violinist gave the shocked look as he dug beneath the scores to find the phone. It drew some chuckles there, but I thought it was a nice touch of comedy. XDXDXD
Intermission! Wow, I was really chionging for the toilet.... learnt my lesson not to drink any water before a concert... But hey, queues for the toilets may be long, yet it goes fast. (That's the first time I saw guys queuing up for the toilets...)
After that, they started with FFVII Bombing Mission, ahh... when will they ever think of doing the main theme of FFVII or even the battle theme... >_< Just love 'em >_< !! While I looked through the program list of the concert, I was wondering what 'Fisherman's Horizon' might turn out in orchestra version. FFVIII music had never really stuck to me other than Faye Wong's 'Eyes on Me' and the piano version of it, 'Julia'. Turned out pretty good, I find, and I was really glad to find it on the CD too! XD
Anyways, those are the pretty memorable parts of it, the ending song, which was an opera, gathering three great talents (sang really well >_<), was nice, but gets a bit draggy at a point. And when all ended... yea, of course!! Encore!!!!!! XDXDXDXD The applause remained, and shouts for encore could be heard. Hehe, I was eyeing the performers on stage, the tuner violinist giving some smirks, and yeap, there was encore. Haha, Arnie quite played with the audience a little, and yea, he surprised us with an unexpected song of 'Terra's Theme' from FFVI. I was surprised too, but someone in the audience was close to the answer when he shouted 'Tina's theme'. Anyways, yesh, surprises. We were asked to vote for the song that would be written for the next tours held other places. Haha, the enthu crowd upstairs even shouted 'Dancing Mad' before the conductor could list out the battle themes for us to vote. And yea, seems like it's 'Jenova's theme' and 'Dancing Mad' which the world will await the performance!
He was standing so near, omg.. But my phone cam is bad...
And surprise surprise! The most anticipated song 'One Winged Angel' performed following that voting. Nobuo Uematsu sensei actually joined in the choir and sang along. Cute guy... he bounced to the rythmn too >_< !! Glad that they thought of incorporating FFVII: AC vids into the screening... The 3D models of the old game vids are gonna drive me up my (inner mind's) wall. A little bit of laughter could be heard when the old FF game screen vids were shown for the FF1 to 3 medley, but it was understandable... But for FFVII, why use the old models when you have super duper life-like new ones around?!?!?!?!? >_< melt arr.....
The question and answer session. Someone in front was video-ing the entire session...
Stayed back for the question and answer session... and realised that many of them in the audience were foreigners from neighbouring countries. Seems like Singaporeans have not much to ask, in which the organiser of the session was pretty desperate to get SG people to ask questions (especially females...) On the question of Uematsu sensei doing voice acting, it seems like he did cast for a role, dunno which, but most probably a really cute one, cos he just suddenly went into a really high pitched voice similar to __NameSomeCutePokemon____, crying pleas of 'help me!' in jap. Anyways, after the session, HY and I came out of the hall, we found a long queue waiting for the autographing event to start.... T_T the CDs were sold out then!! >_< I felt sad... and lookign at the crowd, both of us decided to leave... Hui Ling called me up to locate me, and even offered to help me get an autograph. Ah well, I was already on the bus by then... and hey, I get to go again yea. XD
Second trip on 23rd May 2009
Yes, I wonder how many are itching to bash me this moment. Even my neighbour was screaming and shaking me when she found out I have tix for both days. Wondered if she should go in my place... but I promised I'll get a CD back for all to listen to, even for Xiu. And hey, Alton and I arrived pretty early then. The que was shorter than yesterday's, which was a huge relief. And yea! I got my CD! And YEA!! Got it autographed!!
(Psst... I didn't realise that the conductor was the guy who also conducted the Play! concert Xiu and I attended a few years ago >_<)
That was after the concert, skipped the QnA session, and we were somewhere in the front of the que. Seems like they were pretty strict on the autographing part, only allowing one signature per person....
And yea, Nobuo Uematsu was there again! The same things happen again, encore and last encore performance. However, the atmosphere wasn't as crazy as last night's, when screams and applause just burst out suddenly from the crowd. However, from my new seating in the foyer stalls, I could hear the sopranos better, an overall better balance than yesterday. And something happened again with the guitarist, this time probably the aircon disturbing the pages of his music scores too much, that the conductor came down personally during the performance to help him flip the page while his right arm continues to swing to the beat...XD
And yeap, that's about it! Took a few photos with my phone cam, but dunno how to get them down onto the pc.... T_T Maybe I'll figure it out sometime soon....
Waaaaaa..... XD Yea, young men and women dun always scream for pop star idols. It's the person with talent and passion that inspired, bringing forth a craze...... All respects for this old bubbly fellow!
