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Down memory lane: S’pore artists on Victoria Theatre and Concert Hall

Mayo Martin

Mayo Martin

mayo [at] mediacorp.com.sg

Who doesn’t have any fond memories of the Victoria Theatre and Concert Hall? After the Singapore Symphony Orchestra’s (SSO) opening concert earlier this week, it’s time for the rest of us to get reacquainted once more with these two important performing arts venues after the long makeover.

You can do so at this weekend’s Open House, where you’re invited to drop by and explore the buildings — while catching some performances by various arts groups from 11am all the way until sundown.

“If those walls could speak, I’m sure they will offer us a glimpse into a facet of Singapore’s history that many of us were too young to remember,” said National Arts Council chief executive Kathy Lai.

Indeed, you probably already know about how the concert hall (formerly the Victoria Memorial Hall) was turned into a hospital during World War II (and later a venue for war crime trials), how it was the sight of mass weddings in 1947 and 1951, and how Television Singapura (which later became MediaCorp TV) launched its service there in 1963 (17 television sets were placed all over the area for people to watch).

But this weekend’s performers, too, have their special memories. We asked four of them — Cultural Medallion recipient Santha Bhaskar, T’ang Quartet’s Leslie Tan, organist Margaret Chen and Sri Warisan’s Marina Yusoff — to share these with us.

The VTCH open house is on July 19 and 20, 10am to 7pm. Free admission. For more information, visit http://www.vtvch.com.

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LET’S FORM A BAND

Some bands are formed inside a garage. The T’ang Quartet’s idea of a garage is one of the rehearsal studios in the old concert hall.

“We were basically a garage band and we were born there,” recalled cellist Leslie Tan. “It used to have six studios and we used to rehearse in Studio One.”

It was 1992. Tan and the rest of the Quartet were members of the SSO. “I remember, we would have lunch and rehearsals started at 2pm, 3pm and all the way till evening.” During their free time, they would get together to jam — which eventually led to the formation of the group.

Their first publicity posters were also shot within the premises—with one of the technicians as the photographer. “His name was Kelsey Tan and he was also an artist. For our first show, we shot in the basement, wearing all-black and long-sleeved T-shirts. For our second shoot, in 1993, we went to the rooftop, just below the clock tower. It was a really good shoot. It was a fun time.”

It seemed like a logical step for a group that had literally grown up there as members of the Singapore Youth Orchestra. “I learned a lot of my music in that place, listening to the SSO and other performers. And as the T’ang Quartet, we always loved the Hall. There was something quite muddy in the (acoustics of the) hall, but it had a nice warmth to it.”

The intimacy the place offered was also something to cherish. “The audience was very close to you and immediately after concerts — because there was no backstage — you would walk through the corridor and greet the audience immediately. It’s less glamorous than the Esplanade but it was more like family. There was no divide.”

Rehearsing late at night could be pretty frightening (“You tried not to pay attention to the sounds around you, maybe the building was expanding or contracting with the heat”) but Tan said he never encountered those infamous ghosts, though there were other mysterious goings-on. “Quite a few times, when we were students in the Youth Orchestra, there were stories of people who were caught making out in the dressing rooms or rehearsal studios. It was a nice quiet spot for ghost watching … or mating,” he joked.

(T’ang Quartet performs on Sunday, 3pm, at Victoria Concert Hall.)

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THIS USED TO BE MY PLAYGROUND

Marina Yusoff, creative director of performing arts company Sri Warisan, laughed when asked if she could recall any ghost stories at the notoriously haunted Victoria Theatre of old. Barring tales about fellow performers seeing a woman in white at the spiral staircase backstage or at the basement or of company founder and Cultural Medallion recipient Som Said’s experience of someone calling out her name, she’s never had one herself. Except for one spine-tingling experience in 2005.

It was on opening night of their dance drama Lagenda Tun Fatimah, and she was performing the titular character. “I was delivering my line and suddenly, on my (in-ear monitors), this old, classic Chinese folk song played. And I couldn’t deliver my lines! Like, what the heck was that? Nobody was playing anything in the control room. It played for a few seconds and the whole cast and the backstage crew could hear it. My hair is standing right now,” said the 38-year-old with a laugh.

The company would perform many of their shows, big and small, at the Victoria Theatre right until it closed down for renovation in 2010, a collaboration with Sriwana, Sri Mahligai and Sri Anggerik Bangsawan titled Anak Wayang.

For Marina, her fondest memories stretch back to when she was a teen, beginning as a dancer in a Som Said production at the age of 12.

“I remember the statue of Stamford Raffles and we’d play around it while waiting for our turn (to perform). We’d also play hide-and-seek in the staircase, the dressing room,” she said. “And don’t forget the big mirror opposite our dressing room. Every time we go up to the big stage, we’d first look at the mirror to make sure we look good. It was as big as the whole wall and important to us. You can’t find that mirror anymore in Singapore, even in the Esplanade!”

(Sri Warisan performs today, 11am, at Victoria Theatre.)

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IT’S ALL IN THE FAMILY

The Bhaskars have a very close relationship with the Victoria Theatre.

When Cultural Medallion recipient Santha Bhaskar first arrived in Singapore from India in 1955 with husband KP Bhaskar, her first solo performance was held there that same year. In 1980, it was her daughter’s turn to do a solo show. It was the same thing for her two granddaughters, first in 2004 and in 2010.

“Then-President SR Nathan was the guest of honour in 2010 and he really liked her piece. He immediately told Mr Bhaskar his granddaughter was good,” recalled Santha Bhaskar, 75, adding that her granddaughter, now 18, will be performing the same piece during Bhaskar’s Arts Academy’s performance slot at the’s Open House event.

They’ve done so many performances at the venue that she couldn’t keep count. But the first will always be special — it was organised by the Singapore Indian Fine Arts Society and she was 15, a new bride in a new country, performing in a new theatre only a couple months after arriving.

“In India, I had only seen small theatres and it was, to me, really huge! It was really a culture shock, performing alone on this huge stage with perfect sound. It was like a dream come true.”

She would also remember performing with former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew in the audience. “He used to come to quite a number of performances and me and Mr Bhaskar would be there performing in front of him.”

Earlier this week, she was at the opening concert by the SSO, where Mr Lee’s son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, was in the audience. “I was so happy, like a little girl remembering the little things. The venue looks so good and pretty,” she said of a place that she loves so much for its “positive energy” and “good vibrations”.

She recounted an incident in 1958, when the Bhaskars performed in an Indian production of the Chinese folktale Butterfly Lovers. “We didn’t have enough money to put a deposit so Mr Bhaskar spoke to the manager, who said, ‘Don’t worry, you pay us after the performance. The managers were really, really kind people. They had a feeling for artists. That kind of warmth I don’t see now,” she laughed.(Bhaskar’s Arts Academy performs on Sunday, 6.30pm, at Victoria Theatre.)

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ORGAN OF POWER

If there’s one person who should rightly be associated with the iconic organ at the Victoria Concert Hall, it’s Dr Margaret Chen.

The 62-year-old organist was one of the people responsible for bringing in the venue’s iconic Klais organ centrepiece and for its recent renovation.

In 1983, it was decided that the SSO needed an organ. Its first conductor, Choo Hoey, formed the SSO Ladies League for the main purpose of raising funds to replace the original organ from 1931, which was ruined during World War II. She was one of them.

“I was probably the only organist in Singapore at that time,” quipped Dr Chen, who was part of the steering committee who handled the planning and logistics — a process that stretched all the way to 1987, when the German instrument was finally installed.

She didn’t get to be the one to officially debut the instrument, though. For the first two concerts, big stars from the United Kingdom were flown in. “I think I was maybe the third or fourth, but that’s okay. We wanted to come out all guns ablaze. And I was only 31, 32 back then!”

During the first decade, she would help organise concerts and student recitals, an average of four to five a year. “The most valuable were the student recitals. We would get four to five students together and everyone would play one piece,” she said.

She went overseas for a while but it would seem that the Klais organ always beckoned. When it was up for restoration (in line with the renovation of the buildings), she was back. The main idea was to make it sound less Baroque and more Romantic, to fit in with the SSO’s repertoire. This time, it took only three months. “The organ sounds much richer, warmer and more Romantic sounding. I think we brought it up to date and in accordance to what we’re going to use it for,” she said.

And they plan to put it to good use. There are plans for monthly concerts for the first three years. Dr Chen will be the artistic director of the SSO’s organ programme and the plan is to feature the organ with “something else. Organ with strings, trumpet with organ, and this Christmas, the organ with handbells and a choir. We’re also planning to have a Chinese New Year show with Chinese instruments”. And this time, she’ll be playing the first concert, on Oct 5.

But despite being so closely associated with the organ for so many years, there’s one thing she hasn’t done that other musicians normally do: Give it a nickname.

“It’s so humongous, you can’t just call it Stevie or Mary!” she laughed. “It’s the king of instruments. I don’t rule it, it rules me!”

(Dr Margaret performs today, 11am, at Victoria Concert Hall).

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