NBC

2010 is a very special year for our band, as this year, the 3rd NBC(national band concert) will be held at around 1oth July. In this competition, about 35 schools from Singapore will be participating, and definitely not excluding the Hwa Chong Institution band. Apart from all these, Aichi Meidan High School, an Award Winning Band from Japan, will be also performing. All bands have to play a required march piece, and another choice piece.

Our band is very excited about this upcoming event. We had only about 3 months to practise, and therefore, we practised almost every week in our own sections. However, with our current standard, we might not be able to achieve the top award-Gold with Distinctions, the award we have been aiming for. In the last NBC our school band participated in 2006, we attained a Gold award, behind our target by a mere 0.84%! Our seniors were devastated knowing the results, and have been encouraging us to work extra hard, so that we would not regret like how they did. This gave us a lot of pressure...

Anyway, the pieces we are playing are March Together, and Warabe Uta fantasy.
Warabe Uta Fantasy is a very traditional song, with solos from various instruments including the clarinet and the saxaphone. This is an especially tough piece as there are many places where the time signature changes.
Try listening to it - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4FIAwEbF0A ( played by another band)
March Together is a simple and easy piece with a nice melody. It is, however, a piece that stills requires great co-ordination from all instrument parts. Coincidentally, the composer for this piece is one of the judege for the competition!


The HCI band has came a long way building its reputation. We hope that this competition will allow us to prove our strength once again, and at the same time, be an unforgettable experience for all of us. Good luck to us