So live your life!!!! Yeah!!

The annexe Gallery at the central market hosted the Live your Passion Arts career Fair 2009 where students and the public could be exposed to the arts, on how to get opportunity in the arts, learning on the institution that offers the arts and much more. It was a long day for me since I went there quite early on a Saturday morning only to see that it was still setting up. So I lend a hand in arranging the chairs in the hall so we could start the forum as soon as possible.

The program was split into 5 partitions which was in the morning Music and in the afternoon was drama. The next day which I went to MPO, was Dance, Film and visual arts. Outside the hall there were booths set up by institutions to promote their arts program.

this is ASWARA booth, they were also selling their products and publications. See the box on the table there, It's a whole compilation of shadow puppet plays around south east Asia. I have one and mummy gave it to me!!! It cost around RM200 for the whole box there are around 10 vcd's i think.

I think this is New Era Collage. I never heard of it till I went to Human Rights camp the other day. They don't have music but they have visual arts and drama if I'm not mistaken.

Haha, and this is the Alma matter USM. Dr.Hardy and Sylvester was here. All the music students were hibernating doing a lot of assignments before the MPO show, good luck guys. The concert that I attend was the same, thing is I still prefer matinees because I could take a train to the concert hall at KLCC and still be able to get back before dark.

This is UiTM, apparently the lady grading papers was also from USM...

The banner on the right is from ICOM, and the table with the monitor is from Freedom fest I think??? I'm not too sure.

This is the Hot art exhibition, it still going on despite of the commotion next door

The exhibition hall...art people?? haha.

So this was the hall where the forum was held. I eventually helped arranging the chairs to be able to start soon. The sitar player from Temple of Fine Arts was doing the sound check before the show. She'll be performing after the forum.

This is the program. i think you could click and have a better view.

This is UM's programs to show during the semester. Kinda like our senior recital and stuff.

So these are some pictures of UM's students sound checking before the forum. I didn't want to interrupt their actual performance so I thought the sound checks will be OK.

And so the forum begins, the Music Penal was from Saidah Rastam, the creator of M the Opera, Sean Ghazi, singer, Broadway performer, and even in P.Ramlee the musical, weee I soo miss that. And the last was Kumar Karthigesu a sitar player and composer.

The MC

Kumar was a typical Indian family whereby the arts is important but not as a career. He learned the Mirdangam and vocal since he was four. When he was in The UK where his family was staying, he learned the Sitar. (although he actually wanted to learn the guitar) Upon coming back to Malaysia he initially agreed to study engineering but stopped half way to go to India and to pursue his dreams. Of cource like any other family he had difficulties dealing with his family but his family eventually gave in. He won an award recently, the Anugerah Karyawan Seni, Cameronian Awards by the government that got him 10K, (that's A lot!!) and he became one of the teachers at Temple of Fine arts. From my point of view, he did what he had to do to get what he wanted and that's something that I need to think before doing since I don't have any idea if my parents would not agree of me studying in the arts. But then again, people like Kumar are awarded by the government, playing gigs and all those things that I feel that there is a market in the future. More and more people are appreciating the arts and put a high value in especially in the local music so that our culture doesn't fade away.

Saidah Rastam was previously a lawyer for seven years. Her parents wanted her to have a fixed income so that if anything happens to her, let say if her husband were to leave her she could make a living. She played with the instant cafe theater playing piano and such along the way. After she quit her job, she became a composer and one of her works were M the opera and a piece for "Spirits" in Singapore. There were times where she had depression but eventually bloomed with great works. One interesting fact to her compositional approach is the doing improvisation. I heard that after she wrote her works, she then will ask the performers to improvise again to suite the performer. I think this is very good since that whatever we create we could suite with the performers, thus keeping the performance creative. Improvisation also will keep changing the the course of the whole show, that is today's show will be different than last night and the night before, so sometimes you get to watch a good show or vice versa. It doesn't matter to me because that's the whole idea of the performance. Another interesting factor that artist should have is LESS freedom of expression. I guess that if we have less than we are more daring to do the unthinkable...I'm not sure but, it's definitely something to think about.

Lastly was Sean. I initially thought that he was a new comer during his P.Ramlee album and then sang P.Ramlee the musical. I really didn't know that he was already in Broadway musicals like Miss Saigon, Anna and the King and the King and I. He also played in Rent, and stuff like that. Now I've heard that he'll be moving to L.A to start an acting career there soon. He stared of very young when his mother saw his talent, then in school he has been doing all sorts of plays, musicals and such. Teachers kept talking about him since his English and arts were excellent but didn't do as well in other academic courses. When he went to a boarding school in Singapore, the theater world opened up to him and he then got better exposure. According to Sean, in Singapore teachers encourage him to try for roles in plays wheres in Malaysia was not as encouraging. He then, went to Boston to study theater and then London where the schedules were much more tighter. This is where he enjoys much of his time learning and going in and out auditions. From what I learned from him is that it's not impossible to have a career in the arts and still keep food on the table. Perseverance is a must and proving that you are better than others makes it to pass an auditions. In the end it all comes down to personality...

So I ended my day, going to Subang Parade Flea market to taste free cakes and cookies...yum. I hope there will be more exhibitions, more opportunity in the arts and better exposure for me. I do want to use Music as a tool to keep people together and learning about the world as it is a universal language that everyone could understand...*winks*