Friday October 30, 2009
Labour of love
By ADRIAN YAP C.K.
The KL Sing Song 2009 fest keeps the faith with 19 singer-songwriters and a bumper weekend ahead.
IN music, there’s little that’s more honest than someone, hunched over just one musical instrument, straggling out a song they wrote about a moment in their existence, to an audience. It’s disarmingly “naked” and emotionally powerful, some would argue, even more powerful than a huge stadium-sized gig.
The Troubadours KL collective, consisting of three local singer-songwriters Jerome Kugan, Azmyl Yunor and Tan Sei Hon, has been championing this form of music for over five years now, giving voice to local singer-songwriters and their craft.
For a song: Slowjaxx aka Esam Salleh and Karen Nunis to inject the sweet soulful vibe to the KL Sing Song Festival 2009. “It’s not something that can really be put into words. It’s that tingling sensation when you watch a singer-songwriter, alone on stage, singing his/her own words and melodies with that full investment of thought and feeling,” stated Kugan in a recent interview.
“When you come across someone with just a voice and guitar who just nails it, that’s something beyond entertainment.”
To show just how much they crave that “tingling sensation”, the collective has been organising of the KL Sing Song: Annual Showcase Of Malaysian Singer-Songwriters event for the past five years, an event that’s specially designed for upcoming and established singer-songwriters to show their craft in the most honest of settings – with just them, minimal instrumentation, a spotlight and an audience.
“What we’re doing is, we’re not trying to dress up this thing to become some kind of over-mayonnaised mutant, but to present it in all its wonderful rawness,” he added.
“And then we leave it to the audience to decide if it’s their thing,” said Azmyl.
Karen Nunis “It can be daunting even for some seasoned performers to be alone onstage without a band or a minus-one playing, but it’s exhilarating at the same time because you’re stripped off all those extraneous condiments and only left with the strength of your songs and your delivery of it.”
This year’s edition is scheduled to happen from tonight until Sunday at The Annexe Gallery, Central Market in Kuala Lumpur. It’s a change of venue from the event’s usual home, the KL Performing Arts Centre (KLPac). This year’s event has been expanded to three days from their usual two, featuring 19 performers this time around.
From scene mainstays such as Pete Teo and Meor, rising talents such as Yuna and Otam and newbies such as Wani Ardy and Nick Davis, this year’s KL Sing Song 2009 promises to be yet another eclectic and unique experience.
While certainly not completely void of interest, it’s arguable that the singer-songwriter scene will always play backline to the hip and explosive sounds of mainstream pop rock. For one, there is certainly less money to be seized from corporate sponsors, something the Troubadours collective always knew it had to live without for this upcoming edition of the KL Sing Song fest.
Najwa, Nick Davis, Yuna and Melina William are set to appear at the KL Sing Song fest. Sense of community
“Firstly, we’re kind of idiosyncratic in the way we programme the show, by including lesser known acts,” said Kugan, who added that the event did have sponsors in the past. “I mean, it’s not that we’re averse to sponsorship but our past efforts to secure sponsorship especially from the corporate sector have been met with disappointment or indifference, mostly because a lot of the companies didn’t believe in our vision.”
Telcos, beer companies and fast food brands may have their sights on the rock concerts and dance music festivals, but there is undeniable talent in the singer-songwriter community here.
For instance, Zee Avi, now signed to a prominent US label and based in New York, started off her career at some of the open-mic sessions in the Klang Valley in 2007 while pioneers like Teo have moved on from record-making to acting and pulling together the recent 15Malaysia movie project.
Najwa Malay folk musician Meor, no stranger to the KL Sing Song stage, has also written a book Sembang Tepi Jalan and appeared in Al-Fatehah Memali, the award-winning Freedom Film Festival 2009 independent effort. Liyana Fizi, who achieved fame with jazzy pop outfit Estrella, had her tentative steps in the singer-songwriter scene in one of the monthly Troubadours shows a few years ago.
Despite the lack of neon lights, big banners around town and corporate patronage, the redeeming factor in this community is that, unlike many other scenes, the singer-songwriter scene appears to be one that “looks after its own”.
“This scene is relatively young; it’s admirable and endearing that a non-professional, part-time outfit (Troubadours) has been committed in keeping the KL Sing Song fest going. In fact, it has flourished. None of us started out with the intention of making money ... music is just not about money,” said Teo, who has toured extensively in South Korea and Japan and seen the professional music set-ups in those countries.
“But some form of funding has to come to help out such (independent) events. To take it to the next level, maybe a government grant, a clued-in sponsor can come into the equation.
“So much investment and scrapped together resources have been put in just to have it (KL Sing Song) survive this long,” he added.
Nick Davis This year’s KL Sing Song event will see door takings shared between all the performers. It’s the loyal audience support that has kept the show going for KL Sing Song, and at times, you even get inspired patrons dreaming of taking to the stage.
“I was part of the audience at KL Sing Song in 2007, and it was great to find such a supportive audience that appreciated the music. I knew that I really wanted to play in this festival, and I had my chance last year. I’m really glad to be back again this year,” said Rendra Zawawi, who is renowned in the scene for his smouldering melancholy and intense sets.
“To me, KL Sing Song fans understand what singer-songwriters are about. The fundamental values are there for a proper audience-artiste connection ... the respect for the diverse music, the fun spirit and the freedom of creativity,” he noted.
After weeks of rehearsals, Rendra will be on stage tonight with his acoustic guitar and a violinist friend lending him support.
As revealed by Azmyl, the acts to perform across the three-day event will be accompanied by minimal instrumentation.
“It’s the spirit of the song that we want to celebrate and most acts will be performing solo or at the maximum, we will be having trios,” he said.
As diverse as it gets
Genres on parade include folk, indie, blues, pop rock, soul and R&B. Apart from the industry standard of guitars, there will also be hand-held percussion, violins, cellos and keyboards in the mix. In the case of Edwin & Albert, regarded as Malaysia’s Simon & Garfunkel, it’s the dual melodies that will lead them home, while Slowjaxx’s Esam Salleh has noted that he will be accompanied by a saxophonist.
Unfortunately, the tapdancer that usually accompanies a Slowjaxx show will not be present.
Whether it be singer-songwriters from the middle class or real deal street musicians, KL Sing Song has them all. Buskers like Nik, Meor, Sharidir and Otam might represent the salt-of-the-earth selections but take nothing away from the ladies on the list.
Arguably, female singer-songwriters are the crowd-pullers.
Yuna They are prominent across the three KL Sing Song days with seven of them performing. Whether a veteran blueswoman like Karen Nunis Blackstone, a rising indie star like Yuna or a newcomer act Wani Ardy, the selections are well-informed.
By any standards, KL Sing Song has never been an “in-your-face” event that has taken the mainstream by its horns.
Even Yuna, whose meteoric rise in recent times counts as an exception, is quick to extol the virtues of being a part of this scene.
“I thought once I’ve ‘crossed over’ into the whole mainstream thing, the scene that discovered me would never call me back for events such as this one,” she said before claiming proudly, “I actually owe events like KL Sing Song for helping me jumpstart my career as a singer songwriter.”
The scene’s still existing, fed in many ways by the people who are doing the feeding themselves, a notion confirmed by Kugan.
“The reason why we do this is because we literally have this undying faith in the power of music. People will be cynical and they will say things, but we really do see ourselves as defenders of this music’s sanctity,” he added passionately. “It’s local, it’s handmade.”
Most people who have attended shows organised by the scene such as the collective’s own Doppelganger shows and Reza Salleh’s Moonshine will attest that there’s a sense of community and a “family-like” atmosphere to the way they conduct scene “business”.
“It’s good to be part of the family. I’ve only been in the scene for a year-and-a-half and I’ve met them all. Some, I’ve even became good friends with. The thing about the singer-songwriter scene is that we all work together and help each other out, it doesn’t matter if you’re new or been around for a long time,” exclaimed Nick Davis. “We’re tight that way.”
Another first time performer, Wani Ardy, seems to think that it has much to do with the intimacy and rapport the performers seem to share with their audience. “The audience feels closer to the performers. Even we, the performers, would feel closer to each other.”
So after six vigorous months of planning and choosing and booking the right acts, the stage (and lonely chair) is now set.
Whether it’s going to be a bumper turnout or just a handful of people sitting around a performer, you sense that the Troubadours collective is hardly going to lose much sleep. Its passion for poetic magic has carried it this far and it should continue to carry it forward regardless of the circumstances.
“These are genuine expressions of people’s ideas and feelings. You can be a critic and say it’s not as advanced as what you can get from abroad or, worse, that it’s just a copy, but that’s beside the point,” said Kugan, who pressed home the message, “The point is that it’s here, right in front of you, being performed by someone who is alive and not some imported illusion.”
Tickets for KL Sing Song 2009 are available online at applause.org.my. Per-day admission is RM30 (door). KL Sing Song 2009 takes place at the The Annexe Gallery, Central Market in KL tonight (8.30pm), tomorrow (8.30pm) and on Sunday (3pm show). Hotline: 03-2070 1137.
KL Sing Song 2009
Tomorrow (8.30pm)
Pete Teo
Karen Nunis Blackstone
Meor
Slowjaxx
Edwin & Albert
Wani Ardy
Sunday (3pm)
Ray Cheong
Yuna
Najwa
Otam
Sharidir & Nizam P
Nik
David Knight
RSS
