Hi Madam Tseng, Teresa, and faithful supporters of Teresa!

My apologies to supporters of Teresa for the delay of this performance report though Teresa's performance ended around 3.30pm because I just got back home. Before I even start reporting, I want to make this early announcement to Teresa and Madam Tseng:

Teresa, if you intend to read this report during your examination period, I will gently advise you against it. Don't worry, there aren't any seriously critical pointers in this report, but I will be writing an advanced pointer on song selection and if you are seriously thinking that over, I worry it may clog up your mind, which you will need for your examination papers.

If you really want to read on, I can't stop you but try not mull over that advanced pointer during your examinations, as it will take time to digest and adjust accordingly if you choose to listen to it.

Madam Tseng, it's a honour to have you visiting this fanclub and reading all our posts regularly. I suppose I must watch every single word I type here before I make a fool of myself if I typed something silly and inaccurate since you are an experienced professional singer too. You, of course, have all the freedom to read this performance report and hope it will not disappoint your expectations.

To supporters of Teresa: Here we go....

A) Up Close with Teresa and Madam Tseng

I arrived at Takashimaya Civic Plaza Yellow Ribbon Fair today at 2.34pm and was browsing through the stalls and sales at the booths while waiting for Teresa's performance. While I was sitting down, I saw Teresa arriving at the mcee rest area at 2.40pm and I took a stroll up, hoping to chit-chat with the girl before her performance. Teresa and Renfred were intently listening to the mcee's briefing so I lingered around the art gallery, waiting for the briefing to end first.

To my utter surprise, Madam Tseng recognized me with one look (her memory is incredible - she only saw me for a brief moment last time) and I walked over to her just after the briefing and I finally managed to get up close to Teresa and her mother again. Teresa was dressed in a pink, short-sleeved top and a flowing pair of white pants (she looked absolutely radiant) and was seated with Renfred and another woman, possibly a minder from Mediacorp.

Madam Tseng struck up a conversation with me and we started to talk at length about TFC, how grateful she was to everyone here at TFC supporting Teresa and some personal chit-chat about me. Teresa was seated all that time and was listening to our conversation all that while. I then asked Teresa about how she was coping with the SPH article incident and she nodded that she could manage it well (so all the supporters here, especially Jolyn, who have been worrying about our Teresa can heave a sigh of relief).

Madam Tseng gave her views about how disappointed she was with SPH used Teresa's photograph for such a controversial article and I gave her my humble opinions on it. After this segment of conversation, I asked Teresa about the songs that she'll be singing later on and encouraged her to keep up the good work and jia you. She replied that the songs were "It wasn't meant to be" and "Ni de wei siao" and nodded she would work hard for her performances. I wanted to ask Teresa about the birthday celebration but it would have been impolite since Madam Tseng was actively engaged in further conversation with me.

Frankly speaking, Teresa looked a little tense from my angle and so was I because I had never expected to strike such a long conversation with Madam Tseng. I remembered how Teresa used to describe her mother with a volcano-like temper and I was half-bracing for a thunderous earful from Madam Tseng because I was particularly harsh on our Teresa's performances for a couple of my reports. I thought her mother would erupt on me for grilling her beloved daughter with the criticisms.

Most reassuringly, Madam Tseng, on my first at-length conversation with her, came across as an intelligent, polite and wise lady. She was most expressive about her gratitude to TFC (Hurray for all of us here!) and her attitude towards my advices had been most welcoming, citing that Teresa can only improve if she listens and self-corrects as people onstage usually could not hear themselves sing. Her wisdom came through to me as well when she voiced her strategy in dealing with the SPH article incident.

Both Teresa and Madam Tseng persuaded me to be seated and I took my place at the front rows to get the rare close-up look of Teresa's performance later on.

B) Performance Grading and Analysis

My grading for your performance today is as follows:

Song Selection :               9.5 out of 10
Stage Attire :                     9.0 out of 10
Song Presentation :        9.0 out of 10
Audience Interaction : 9.5 out of 10
Mcee Interaction :          8.5 out of 10


1) Song selection

Teresa sang the first song "It wasn't meant to be" by Sandy Lam and the second song "Ni de wei siao" by F.I.R. Both songs were suitably introduced to all the audience and I liked the way Teresa connects the songs' relevance to the event content. Keep that up!

Advanced Pointer: I have charted your song selections ever since the CSS competition had ended. It is indeed encouraging to know that you are trying different genres of songs with different song difficulties, fully showcasing your singing talent and skill. However, I was thinking that perhaps after your examinations, for your future performances, you can consider the following options:

a) Choose new songs from other singers to showcase because you have already repeated some of the recently sung songs in consequent performances. That will ensure freshness in your song selection, continuing the perfect showcase of your amazing singing talent and skill.

b) Use back some of the older songs that you have sung during CSS competition. This path of song selection will help people to remember how you came about to be the rising Superstar you are now and of course, excites supporters who will get a refresher experience on how you first started out.


2) Stage attire

I like your stage attire today. Nice, comfortable looking and yet presentable in the level of formality of the event. As I have said to you, it's a golden opportunity to participate in the Yellow Ribbon Fair performance because the Singapore Police Force (Prison Service) has always been very stringent about their guest performers and you did everyone who supported you proud today. Well-dressed. Good impression for Singapore Police Force (Prison Service) as well.


3) Song presentation

Your songs sounded absolutely great even though the speakers were not really very good. Though I was seated right in the front row, I could feel the whole audience mesmerized by your singing. The audience size ballooned even more when you started singing, drawing even passers-by along Orchard Road!

It was really hard to pick up the glitches because I was finding myself sitting back, enjoying your singing even more, as you blended the singing with a touch of sincerity for the audience. THAT is what I meant by great singing because it's not purely about techniques, it is also about injecting sincerity and breathe soul into the very songs you sing. It's how you moved the audience. Great work! You heard the applause today yourself. =)

Now...if you really really want the finer technical points (which I forcibly lifted myself from the luxury of enjoying your singing to pick out). Here they are:

a) Endnotes to some of the final lines of "It wasn't meant to be" (last repetition). To sing that part well, you can either drag the endnotes or grasp them decisively. But you sort of did something in-between, which sounded a little weird. Stage movement was also less than average because you had the opportunity to move left and right more in this song but you chosed to remain more or less in the same position, which deducted some tiny fraction of points in the song presentation.

b) This has to do with the overdose of dry ice for the second song (You were almost invisible for 15 seconds because some fellow could not control dry-ice properly - quite amusing for the audience to see the silly stage effect). Anyway, if the dry-ice or lighting obstructs the audience's view of you onstage, you must take the initiative to step forward and let them see you, not hold your breath and let the dry-ice dissipate. I know there are debris onstage but you could have moved 2 to 3 steps forward and still remain onstage. Minor percentile points deducted for that missing initiative for this stage technicality/obstacle.

To supporters: Some funny episode happened though. Whilst Teresa was singing onstage, a young toddler actually moved to the centre aisle and started dancing! (See? Teresa, your songs can even move toddlers to dance in public. Amazing.) The toddler was holding a bottle of mineral water though and I was already bracing myself to intercept the bottle if the toddler suddenly throws it at Teresa out of sheer excitement (was mentally calculating how many steps I needed to take to catch the bottle before it hits Teresa and not crash into the toddler myself - phew, some real mental work-out for me then). Fortunately, he did not throw and his mother picked him up just as he wanted to climb onstage to share the stage with Teresa (Hahaha...)

4) Audience Interaction

Keep up the excellent audience interaction here. With your mega-watt smile and nice little encouragement to keep the event going, the audience will continue to love to see you onstage at any event. Everyone at TFC and idollic.com/teresa/ can expect to see another new influx of supporters because of Teresa's excellent performances again.


5) Mcee Interaction

I think your mcee interaction skills are there but today's mcees did not seem to be very experienced and their conversation topics lacked entertainment or attraction. One point to note is not to be too quick in your friendly banter with the mcees because you seemed to have interrupted one of the mcees' tease question all too quickly. You don't need to joke for today's event as you have made up more than enough with your mini appeals for the crossiants and encouragements. Points for mcee interaction today are lower than previous performances, predominantly due to mcee inexperience and lack of stage entertainment..

I left Takashimaya at 3.50pm after watching Renfred's performance because I have another appointment to catch but not before I bought two of the crossiants from the Fair (chocolate-laced, tasted quite delicious).

Okay. That wraps up today's performance report. Hope all of you had fun reading and learning about Teresa's performance today.

Madam Tseng, it was a good conversation with you and I hoped we can continue it the next time we meet again.

Teresa, good luck for your papers and we hope to hear from you really soon when you are free to post~~!

Sean Ho

"Music clears the mind, fills the heart, moves the soul."