Learning To Conduct

I'd never learned conducting. I do not know the basics of conducting. I never knew how to teach my students to conduct, even when I was handling the school choir.

This weekend, the opportunity came for me to learn conducting. The teacher was imported all the way from Singapore, even though she was originally from Kuching. Her credentials were colourful, and I had looked forward to learning some basics.

I'd indeed learned a lot this weekend. I came to know terms that I had never heard of before - home base, rebound, ictus, direction. So technical! But then it was not enough to know the jargons. Practice was important. And we had opportunities to put into practise what we had learned.

It may have looked easy. But it far from easy. Everything had to be taken into consideration. The posture was important. There mustn't be movement for the head and the body. Yet you could not be tense. The movement of the hands have got to be precise, and any unnecessary movements were forbidden. Phew, it was so difficult. Even more so, my hand co-ordination has always been quite poor.

However, the workshop had rekindled my interest for choral music. It had been a while since I sang in a choir. Though practice sessions were tedious and time-consuming, the music was always beautiful. I wondered if I could be committed enough to re-join to the city choir?