I have to say, this was quite unexpected.

A few Tuesdays ago, I was walking down the corridors of school, and just before lunch ended and everyone was getting ready to go to class, Mr. Marlon stopped me in my tracks. He asked me with a smile: “Are you ready for Saturday?”. My expression fades, what’s on Saturday? He told me that I had to perform 3 songs for the Food and Fun Fair this weekend with my music class. Because as DP music HL students, we try to participate in these sorts of events as much as possible. At that same moment, Akhil passes by us and I stop him and asked him if he knew about this. “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that…” he said. This guy has known since last Saturday and forgot to told me, how could that be?

Anyway, after enough confused glances back and forth, we left to music. We had to think of 3, at least 2, songs that we could realistic do with a 4 day practice limit.  For those next 3 days, we debated and went in circles about a few songs, but we didn’t finalize the list. On Friday, we finally agreed to do “From the Start” by Laufey (which we had done before at the Vidyaloka concert in December) and “Stand by Me”. Although the DP Music class is a group of 5, only me, Chirath, and Akhil did it, but the small group was comfortable and we made it work quite well.

I got there a bit before the show, it could be called more of a ‘jam’, and rehearsed a bit. I was kind of disappointed because I was slightly sick and my voice was not in the mood to function, so when I sang it sounded harsh and nasally. Despite that personal obstacle, during the breaks, Akhil and Chirath did smooth solos on the piano and the guitar and left the audience speechless.

After finishing our second number, the crowd was cheering us on for one more! I was very happy with their appreciation and enthusiasm, but the 3 of us just looked at each other. Everyone knows that a band always has 2 more songs that they known just in case the crowd cheers for more, however, in this case it was not us. After around 30 seconds scrambling on the “stage” (outside the cafeteria), Akhil suggested we do “Just the Two of Us”, his absolutely most favorite piece in the world. Chirath knew the chords, and I somewhat knew the melody, improv was the way to go. We divided the lyrics amongst each other, and we performed.

I have to admit, that day was amazing, it was unexpected, and that’s what I loved about it. Usually, I’m quite nervous about performing, but I enjoyed performing for the Food and Fun fair because everyone was doing their own thing: eating, playing, talking. There weren’t any piercing eyes and the pressure, it was something light on my heart. One of the many reasons I love the OSC community is because of these organized events where you have opportunities to do whatever you want, and people will always be interested.