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One day when I get round to installing Chinese software, I will write in Chinese.

FEI YU QING AT THE XVII MACAU INTERNATIONAL MUSIC FESTIVAL ON24/25 OCT 2003

Author: F2 (Feverish Fan)

Prologue

When I arrived at the Macau Cultural Centre Grand Auditorium at around 1910, I was pleasantly surprised by 2 things. Firstly, I saw a huge floral display, a glowing tribute from 6 of Xiao Ge’s Singapore fans. Please see the clipped photograph of the lovely congratulatory display and the names of the fans are visible in the photo. F1must be very happy to see it. Secondly, the organizers had arranged for F1 to pre-sign some 200 of his latest CDs and had put them up for sale. I snapped up 2 of them, delighted that I did not have to queue for them.

F1’s fans in Macau

The lower house of the Grand Auditorium was completely sold out for the first concert. He definitely had more male fans in Macau than Singapore. Around half of the audience was men, not young ones though. The audience was extremely PROPER in their behavior and observed the “No Photography. No videotaping and recording ”rule. I did not see a single flash from any camera and hence gave up all thoughts of stealing a shot of F1.

The Macau Orchestra

Based on the Singapore concert experience, F1’s band was much too loud, brassy and emphatic. The much-acclaimed Macau Orchestra was softer, velvety and OH so smooth. The Orchestra, half Asian and half Caucasian, seemed to have enjoyed themselves too. Some of the violinists were smilingly taping their bows on their score-sheets for the ENCORE. The guest conductor Mr Chen XieYang from the Shanghai Orchestra was delightfully deft and competent in his delivery.


Ke Yi Min and Zhao Yong Hua

I personally feel that Zhao Yong Hua was a poor choice of a singing partner for a concert with chamber music. She chose the wrong numbers and tried bantering with the audience. That fell flat! Poor lady! The audience warmed up to her a little when she sang the last number from the Titanic “My heart from go on”.Ke Yi Min, on the other hand, had absolute stage presence. She commanded attention both with her powerful vocals as well as with costumes. The audience loves her. Her first costume was a black number as drop-dead as Princess Diana’s little black dress. The other 2 were equally stunning. She sang beautifully.

F1 ( New Nickname Of Xiao Ge 2003)

F1 started rather shakily. After the intermission, he admitted that he was nervous about performing with an acclaimed orchestra even though this was his second experience with the team. However, he recovered his COOL very quickly. As befitting an international music festival item, he did not crack any of his off-colored lewd jokes nor delivered any parody. Personally, I think these are needless. Because of this, he had time for some 50+ songs. He even had a CHANGE of SUIT after the intermission, from a dark navy blue to a chocolate brown one.

Xiao Ge has such a lovely angelical voice. Once his voice opened up, he sang like a skylark and with nothing less than FEELINGS, just RAW FEELINGS. He gave so much of himself that his body arched with effort and he seemed OH so serious, reaching out for his comfort button more often than on TV appearances. He SANG BOTH HIS LUNGS AND HEART OUT, reaching out to the inner recesses of the audience’s memory banks and touching us all deeply. Once the rapport was established, the audience turned rapturous but firmly dignified, without torches or whistles. Nonetheless, they showed that they love his singing!

He sings with much more feelings now than some 20 years ago. I will not type out the Chinese numbers here, as the hanyu pinyin will not make much sense here. He sang Moon River and one of Paula Hsu’s Cantonese numbers. He was visibly enjoying himself with the ENCORE numbers, just a miserable 2. I thought he must had wanted to be considerate to the orchestra players who must be very tired playing from 2005 to 2250 with only a 15-minute intermission.

Epilogue

Just before leaving for Shanghai the next morning, I read the rave reviews in 2 Macau newspapers. I hope he is invited to perform at Singapore’s Esplanade-by-the-Bay, maybe with a Chinese orchestra! Xiao Ge said that he could not have imagined singing his way to the Shanghai Grand Theatre and with a Western orchestra at Macau. It all sounded so DIVINE (“shenqi”). We, as fans must be feeling likewise. When I first heard him some 20 years ago, I was a poor university undergraduate, too poor to afford his tapes and nightclub performances. He has progressed from nightclubs to ……, you know what! By some divine intervention and blessings, we are able to watch him in even better form now and in very august settings. It’s unbelievable. I hope his career SPINS ON and ON!