The members of a cappella group, MICappella - Peter Huang, Lee Ein Ein, Calin Wong, Goh Juni and Eugene Yip (Ng Wei Jin couldn’t make it) - are so tight that it’s almost as if they are one entity. They finish each other’s sentence and will go of on a tangent without warning, although they all seem to come to the same consensus. They are Singaporean, and a rarity: In a scene where English is the predominant language, they sing Chinese pop songs. Last year, they made headlines when they came in second in China’s version of The Sing-Off, and they’ve been making waves all around the region. And they’re one of the most fun groups we’ve had the pleasure to know.

SO LET’S TALK ABOUT WHY YOU RELEASED THIS ALBUM...

Juni: We wanted this album to be a memorable “souvenir” of our time in the Sing-Off competition and as we discussed, the idea just grew and grew, and we recorded more and more songs, until it became this.

Peter: It was original supposed to be a four or five track EP...

Eugene: Also, whatever we did in the competition, we had to change the arrangements and we wanted something that was different from our previous EPs. The CD is actually a big step-up for us.

BUT WHY DO A CAPPELLA IN THE FIRST PLACE? AND CHINESE POP SONGS AT THAT?

Peter: We’ve known about a cappella for a while.

Calin: We were singing in schools and all that.

Peter: And we always wondered why nobody was doing pop a cappella so we wanted to do a crossover, which has happened in other parts of the world. But being bilingual and from Singapore, we wanted to do something that reflected our background.

Calin: Hence the Chinese and English pop songs, although ours is the token English song. The reason why we wanted to do it in Chinese is because it’s a new idea, and hopefully it would bring something fresh to the a cappella scene.

Peter: We listen to Chinese pop songs, listen to Chinese radio, watch Chinese concerts, so we’re not doing something that’s not us. It just so happened that the a cappella scene, for whatever reason, is predominantly in the English language. So we wanted to change that.

Eugene: We also didn’t want to discount the fact that we’re effectively bilingual. You throw us an English song, we’ll sing an English song; you throw us a Chinese song, we’ll sing that. Even though we mainly sing Chinese songs, we can do practically anything. We have a token Korean song...

Juni: ...Not Gangnam Style – we haven’t learnt Gentlemen...

Eugene: ...Indonesian songs, Hokkien songs...

THE BIG THING FOR YOU LAST YEAR WAS THAT YOU CAME IN SECOND IN THE SING-OFF IN CHINA, BEATING WHAT, A BILLION OTHER CONTESTANTS?

Calin: There were 16 groups, then down to the final two.

DID YOU EXPECT TO GET TO THE FINALS?

Juni: It was very unexpected. We were there for so long and we were surprised when the judges picked us to return each week. We tried our best and didn’t expect anything. We wanted to get all the way to the end, but we thought, ‘It’s our first time, it’s overseas and everybody else was so accomplished’. We

Peter: We had no idea what the audience liked or didn’t like.

Calin: It’s a new market for us.

Peter: We would do a song that we thought was a okay performance but the response would be like, “oh my god that was amazing”. Then we’d do another song that we thought was awesome, and they’d be like, “meh”.

Calin: It was like, what do you want?

Eugene: We were in the top 16, and pretty much everyone else was singing English songs. And we were the only ones doing Chinese songs.

Calin: We were the foreign group and we were the ones singing in Chinese.

Peter: We were looking at them going, “Why do you have so many English songs?” and they were going, “Why do you have so many Chinese songs?”

IT’S BRUTAL BUT THIS HAS TO BE ASKED: WHAT WAS IT LIKE BEING THE FIRST LOSER?

Juni: I think we were very happy to have come so far. We were in China for about two to three months...

Peter: ... And we needed the laksa badly!

Eugene: We did have friends who brought chicken rice for us!

Calin: We were so close to tears when we ate the chicken rice – it never tasted so good!

Peter: You know the chilli that comes with it… that was… wow!

Juni: Yes, we are very local.

Eugene: Anyway, we were a little crushed that we didn’t come in first, but even though we didn’t, kudos had to be given to the winners, who were really, really good.

Calin: We became close friends with them, actually. So every time we go to Beijing, we’ll meet up with them for dinner…

Eugene: …and sing One Night In Beijing. In Beijing.

Juni: Which is in the CD by the way.

OKAY, LET’S TALK ABOUT THE CD. WERE ALL THE SONGS IN IT THE ONES YOU SANG IN THE COMPETITION?

Peter: With the exception of the originals - Here We Go and Na Xin Nian, yes.

Juni: We have 11 songs, two are originals with Na Xin Nian not a song from the competition. The rest are vastly improved versions of what we have in our repertoire or songs that we did in China, because sometimes on the spot, we had to change our arrangements.

Peter: They would tell us, the night before the recording, Oh you have to sing a version Happy Birthday – in three different styles at the same time!

Juni: So the songs that we chose for the album are songs that resonated with us, as well as songs that we feel the audience will like.

Calin: Na Xin Nian is kind of linked to the competition though, in that is captures the feelings and the emotions of what we went through during the competition in China. It’s a kind of nostalgic song describing our journey.

Peter: Hence everyone gets to sing lead on this song.

WHAT ABOUT HERE WE GO? IT IMPLIES A STARTING, BUT YOU GUYS ACTUALLY STARTED SOME TIME AGO, IN 2009.

Juni: The song is not just indicative of where were are going, but where we want to go. I’m sure we all have a ways to go to get to wherever we want to go – personally, as well as in a group.

Calin: The Sing-Off was like a springboard for us, to move on to bigger and better things. So it’s like, “Let’s go”.

IS IT EASY TO COME TO A CONSENSUS ABOUT WHERE TO GO?

Eugene: We tend to agree.

Calin: I think everybody wants the best for the band, so if there are arguments, we still know that it’s all for the best of MICappella.

WHO HAS THE FINAL SAY, THE POWER OF VETO?

Calin: The manager!

YOUR CONCERT ON MAY 31 IS THE LAUNCH THE ALBUM...

Calin: Our 9.30pm is sold out! So we have opened a 7.30pm slot too.

Eugene: We also have another show in June at Hood Bar. It’s a big thank-you to our fans.

Peter: The Esplanade one sold out so fast. Usually, you wait until the final two weeks to do a big push to sell tickets for your show, but when we checked, it was sold out. It’s a good problem. But what do we do? Well, open another show…

Juni: We actually didn’t even publicise it.

WHAT IS YOUR SHOW GOING TO BE LIKE?

Peter: Visually, we won’t have any instruments, but aurally, we will sound as full as any band.

Calin: Except some high energy and an explosive performance.

Peter: We promise you – no instruments, no playback, everything is going to be live.

Eugene: We actually like that you like the song first then see how it was done, so if you are there, you can try closing your eyes first and then open your eyes.

Peter: But just don’t close your eyes and fall asleep, please.

WHAT ARE YOUR EXPECTATIONS FOR THE SHOW?

Calin: We’ve been working very hard for the performance...

Juni: ... We even have choreography. I think it’s very rare that an a cappella group does mainstream pop and dance moves. We did start by listening to boy bands and girl bands.

BOY BANDS AND GIRL GROUPS? LIKE WHO?

Juni: Like SNSD.

Calin: We actually met them in Hong Kong.

Peter: You bet we did! We walked next to them!

Juni: Dial it down.

Peter: Sorry.

Juni: For our album, we did put in quite a bit of effort. We did EPs before, just five songs, but this time the recording process was much longer.

HOW LONG WAS IT?

Calin: It’s about four hours per person per song. So there are six of us. So it’s 24 x 11.

Eugene: Then there’s mixing time, mastering and all that.

Calin: Each song would be mixed three or four times.

Peter: One even went up to six mixes.

Eugene: We had a really great team: The mixing engineers, the guy who mastered our album won a Grammy…

Calin: …Tom Anderson did the arranging.

Juni: It was an all-star team.

Peter: Whom we’ve never actually met in real life!

Eugene: Hopefully we will in November.

WHY IS THAT?

Peter: We’re planning to head over to the States. Check our Facebook. We’ll let you know.

WHAT IS THE BEST OR WORST THING ABOUT BEING IN MICAPPELLA?

Ein Ein: The worst is that I cannot go on holiday. I was planning to go to South Africa and have breakfast with giraffe...

Peter: ... not a gorilla?

Ein Ein: ...but now I can’t because we’re preparing for the concert!

Juni: That’s a good thing as well, because if you’re not busy, then why are you doing this right?

Eugene: Busy is good.

Peter: We fly around quite a lot as it is.

Calin: I like flying around.

Peter: But I always get the middle seat.

Calin: We’ve been to Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Austria…

Peter: ...In July we have a trip to Sarawak.

Eugene: Some of the big name festivals we did were the Hong Kong Asia Music Festival, which we just did, together with Kit Chan…

Peter: …and SNSD!

Eugene: We went to Guangzhou, Beijing and Shanghai for the Strawberry Festival. It was really good. About 80,000. We didn’t see any strawberries. Just people.

IS SINGAPORE READY FOR AN A CAPPELLA TAKEOVER?

Peter: I think the onus is on us to do our jobs well. If we sing well, we perform well…

Calin: …and the word will get out. Personally, I think the scene in Singapore is getting bigger. I was in bus the other day and I heard a few college kids talking about singing and vocals. I think it will be more competitive, hoping it will be more competitive.

Peter: I heard that there are some a cappella clubs in tertiary institutions like Republic Polytechnic, ITE and their new batches of sign-ups are getting larger and larger every year. It’s good.

Eugene: But in terms of the mainstream audience at large, it’s all about the angle. We want them to like the song first. Don’t care whether it’s a cappella, whether is a local band – like the song first. And then after find out all the other stuff. But it’s great that all these tertiary institutions have vocal groups of their own, but that’s still a subset of the entire mainstream audience. We’re still trying to get out there.

Juni: I think it’s good that the community is growing at the same time and pace and that everyone is able to talk to each other.

THE A CAPPELLA COMMUNITY IS VERY TIGHT HERE, RIGHT?

Calin: Yes, we are very tight-knit.

Peter: You should come for one of these “acaparties”.

Eugene: Or “Drunkappella”.

Peter: Imagine a whole bar full of a cappella singers doing Bohemian Rhapsody, somehow in harmony.

Juni: But Happy Birthday is always out of tune.

Eugene: The largest group I’ve experienced is 13 a cappella groups, about 200 people, in one bar.

Peter: We had one hangout in Korea, where we had seven or eight groups from different continents.

Calin: The Sing-Off itself has a large group of singers, so after the concert, we always get together and have dinner.

WHAT ELSE IS UP THIS YEAR?

Peter: Our Sarawak trip, this coming concert, the June concert, hopefully United States in November…

Juni: … and we are probably going to start talking about our second album. We just released our first album, but we want to carry on with the momentum, so hopefully in the later half of the year, that will be a consideration.

Calin: And of course, we’ll keep on promoting our current album.

Eugene: We may even have a few singles.

Calin: So if you are interested in buying our CD, get it at CD-Rama, HMV, That CD Shop or come to our concert and get it there.

MICappella perform May 31, 7.30pm, Esplanade Recital Studio. Tickets from Sistic. Visit their Facebook page for more details (https://www.facebook.com/MICappella)