Sunday, May 2, 2010

The Ash Grove




OK ! Gotta give credit to AsH for reminding me of this song in her blog. I didn't want to write my comment there but I'll just lift the part of this song !

When I was in the lower form (of my secondary school), I was a member of ( HORROR OF HORRORS !) of the school choir ! I remember having to practice after school just about every other day . OMG---I could even remember the name of the instructor , Mr David Pang.  He was so enthusiastic about it.

The darndest thing about those practices was that we had to practice on stage in the school hall. Nothing wrong with that ! But when you have all the macho badminton players practicing in the same hall - then there were problems. It was quite a blow explaining to the guys why we were joining this 'softies' activity.

You see, a few friends and I were actually 'volunteered members' - courtesy of Mr Pang. It was a situation where ' you join my choir or I'll report you to the office regarding ...' one of our many pranks in the school. But he was a really nice guy so we didn't really mind . Besides that's an opportunity for us to know more girls. ( oh the things we do for those damsels!).

It was quite nerve-wrecking when we had to sing and Mr Pang would come up close to each of us to detect any wrong note ! I could just picture him with all his gestures and body movements getting so involved. The first time we saw this, we almost died laughing.

Anyway this went on for more than a year - then my voice 'broke' - and I was free !

The Ash Grove was one of the songs we had to practice nearly a million times a week ! But it was fun !

The ash grove, how graceful, how plainly tis speaking
The wind through it playing has language for me;
When o'er the light through it's branches is breaking,
A host of kind faces is gazing on me,
The friends of the childhood again are before me.
Fond memories waken as freely I roam.
With soft whispers laden it's leaves rustle o'er me,
The ash grove, the ash grove alone is my home.

3 comments:

anak si-hamid said...

Sunnysideup's a pansy, SSu's a pansy!!! What a secret!

You're lucky. We had to sing Christian hymns like "All day, all night, angels watching over me, my lord".

But you cannot beat ph's gang at JSS. Remember 'Burung kakatua' and letrum, letrum mulala? Well their version was 'let's cium the buaya' i.e. the music teacher.

Good story, from Walter the softie.

ph said...

We also made fun of her hairy legs..

imsunnysideup said...

Like I said- the side benefits far out-weigh the embarrassment ! We always had the last say when we had the girls walking out with us while the badminton players only had each other ! heheheheh...swing low, sweet chariot.....whatever lah... we had our last laugh....hahahah