‘There’s something about singing together’: 12 fun facts and stories behind our national songs

CNA Insider

'There's something most singing together': 12 fun facts and stories behind our national songs

What prompted songwriters to pen some of the near dearest National Solar day tunes? The series Striking A Chord: The Songs That Fabricated Singapore uncovers their origins, evolution and more than.

'There's something about singing together': 12 fun facts and stories behind our national songs — Singer-songwriters Dick Lee and Shabir Tabare Alam join their voices for Habitation.

SINGAPORE: Easily up if y'all accept heard this year'due south National Day Parade (NDP) theme song.

The Road Ahead, written and composed by Linying, 27, and Evan Low, 31, has been warmly received by listeners since its release last month.

National songs accept been role of Singapore'due south nation-building efforts for decades, and many have interesting stories and personalities behind them.

Vocaliser-songwriter Shabir Tabare Alam, 36, 1 of the performers of this year's theme song, uncovers little-known facts most pop tunes in the series Hit a Chord: The Songs That Made Singapore.

Hither are 12 things to know as you sing forth to onetime and new favourites while tuning in to the parade.

In that location is an increasing complexity regarding Singaporeans feelings virtually their nation, said Linying.

ane. I EARLY DITTY CAME FROM COLOMBO

An early 'Singapore' song was Singapore Town ("Yous could take a little trip around Singapore town …").

It was start performed in 1967 by The Sidaislers, a singing group in St Andrew's Cathedral whose members were mostly sixteen-year-former schoolgirls at the time.

According to Peggy Daroesman, a Sidaisler who now lives in Australia, the song was adjusted from Colombo Boondocks, a song written nearly the capital of Ceylon, or present-day Sri Lanka.

CNA traced the original lyrics back to 1965, two years before Singapore Boondocks was outset sung.

2. THE EARLY DAYS HAD 'Proficient SLOGANS BUT Non GOOD LYRICS'

National songwriting competitions were held regularly in the 1960s and 70s and drew hundreds of entries.

"The aim of these competitions was to promote songs that captured the essence of this Singapore spirit or the Singapore style of life," said Aloysius Ho, who wrote a thesis on nationalist songs and nation-building in Singapore.

But why are many songs from the competitions hardly recognised or sung today?

This may offering a clue: In a 1977 paper report, songwriting judge Robert Yeo was quoted every bit saying that "many lyrics were based on public campaigns", which made "good slogans only not good lyrics".

"The language is abstract. And if you were to read the songs without the melody, I wouldn't say that they're impressive," he told Shabir.

Songwriting contests were a regular occurrence.

3. LEE KUAN YEW WAS PAYING ATTENTION

The dearth of songs that anybody in Singapore knew how to sing did not escape the observe of the founding prime government minister.

"Lee Kuan Yew believed that … there was something nearly singing together, which draws out the spirit of people, which enhances this sense of community, this sense of being together," said sometime top ceremonious servant Lim Siong Guan.

4. JINGLES WERE EVERYWHERE IN THE 1980S

The "fun" decade was the 1980s, marked past "a real renaissance", said vocaliser-actress Jacintha Abisheganaden.

Jingles were everywhere. One of Singapore's almost enduring campaign jingles was Make Courtesy Our Way Of Life. At the superlative of its popularity, "even in nightclubs, they requested this song", recalled the voice behind information technology, local star Rahimah Rahim.

"Courtesy is for free, courtesy is for you and me," went the lyrics.

5. A CANADIAN WROTE THREE OF THE Best-LOVED SONGS

We Are Singapore, Stand Upwards For Singapore and Count On Me, Singapore were written by a Canadian called Hugh Harrison.

In 1984, the government invited tenders for a marketing entrada to create excitement about Singapore's 25 years of cocky-government. McCann Erickson, the advert agency Harrison was working for, proposed Stand For Singapore to accompany the advertisements — and nailed it.

Following the 1985 recession, civil servant Richard Tan deputed a sequel to "tell a story of commitment and confidence". Count On Me, Singapore "was the right response", he said. The song sold more than 100,000 cassette tapes in 1986.

"Thereafter, we had We Are Singapore. I got Hugh Harrison involved in all this. And he was a wonderful, wonderful writer," said Tan.

Lookout man: The hole-and-corner history behind this National Day vocal (3:05)

6. HIS IDENTITY WAS NOT WIDELY PUBLICISED

Earlier this twelvemonth, Count On Me, Singapore was the subject area of battling claims when Indian composer Joseph Conrad Mendoza asserted that he had come up with the tune start. He later withdrew the claim.

Through the episode, more Singaporeans came to know virtually Harrison, whose identity as its lyricist had not been widely publicised.

The sheet music of Count On Me, Singapore stated that the copyright belonged to the Ministry of Communications and Information, but "in that location should've been the composer's name as well", noted musician Jeremy Monteiro, who arranged the song'due south music.

"(The officials) didn't quite know how to bargain with the fact that (the lyrics) were written by a non-Singaporean," said Harrison, who now lives in Alberta, Canada.

"They were nervous that people would somehow reject (the songs) if they establish out."

WATCH: The commencement episode in full — Count On Me, Singapore: Who'south backside your favourite national songs? (46:53)

Tan said he did consider looking for local composers at the time, merely the songs that were sent to him "didn't have the kind of grandness that (he) wanted for the nation".

7. THE First NDP WITH CROWD SINGING WAS IN 1986

When the Ministry building of Defence revamped the format of the NDP in 1986, officials felt that the parade "shouldn't but be a prove", recalled Lim, the ministry's permanent secretary from 1981 to 1994.

"Information technology'southward something that Singaporeans should exist involved in," he said. "Singing was an important part of it."

viii. THE Superlative MANDARIN NDP SONG WAS A TV SERIAL Hit

The most sung Mandarin vocal at the NDP is really the theme song of a long-running 1980s television serial called Neighbours. Voices From The Center was written past Wen Xueying; her junior higher friend Tan Kian Mentum wrote the music.

Voices From The Middle is among the songs that take struck a chord with Singaporeans.

The yr was 1985, and Wen "couldn't observe a suitable job" after graduation, as the economic system was in the doldrums. While passing the Kallang River, she felt she "couldn't find (her) purpose in life amid the sea of people".

It so occurred to her that although each person is insignificant, there is "strength in us".

The song won a National Trades Matrimony Congress songwriting competition in 1986, and its grassroots entreatment led to its inclusion on the listing of National Day songs in 1988.

9. DICK LEE WAS FEELING HOMESICK WHEN HE WROTE Abode

In 1997, vocalist-songwriter Dick Lee was living in Hong Kong when he was approached to pen a vocal for the Sing Singapore festival.

Having spent seven years abroad, he was feeling homesick when writing Abode. Information technology became a new favourite with Kit Chan singing information technology at the 1998 parade.

WATCH: Kit Chan on NDP song Abode: 'Whenever I am feeling depression' was thought a terrible start (2:58)

"The last matter I expected was for it to exist even an NDP song. Because the NDP songs of the by were very rah-rah," said Lee. "This i was completely the opposite."

The song remains "the proudest thing (he'due south) ever done".

10. NEARLY EVERY Year HAS SEEN A NEW THEME SONG SINCE

The NDP songs that have been commissioned since Home include Together (1999), written by music producer Ken Lim; Where I Belong (2001) by vocalist-songwriter Tanya Chua; and We Volition Get At that place (2002), written by Lee and performed by Stefanie Sun.

11. ELECTRICO REWROTE HISTORY

In 2009, Singapore saw the beginning indie stone band front an NDP theme song. Electrico's singer-guitarist David Tan remembers getting a telephone phone call from Ivan Heng, the parade'due south creative director that year, i morning while he was notwithstanding in bed.

"(Ivan's) vision for information technology was well-nigh looking frontward," said Tan.

And I started to already … figure out that this would be a great opportunity to try and empower people in a unlike way, by kind of getting them to decide what they'd like to run across for themselves."

The result: What Exercise You Run into. Information technology helped to nudge National Twenty-four hours songs in a new direction.

Musician Charlie Lim, who put a new spin on Harrison's We Are Singapore for 2018's NDP, feels in that location is less need for a "nationalistic agenda" these days.

"There's more a need for expression of what it means to exist Singaporean. And allow'southward not look at things through rose-tinted lenses. Let'due south call it for what it is," he said.

"But at the same time, it'southward about taking ownership. It'south by accepting that it's not perfect, just it'southward ours."

WATCH: The second episode in full — What makes a National Day song hit 'home'? (48:03)

Harrison added: "The free energy has been to endeavor and become away from the tiptop-downward approach."

12. FOUR LEAD SINGERS Accept SINGAPORE ON THE ROAD AHEAD

Besides Shabir, this year'southward theme song is performed by Linying, Sezairi Sezali, 34, and Shye-Anne Brown, 18.

NDP 2022 creative director Boo Junfeng, who was on the committee that selected the song, said that in the past, he had advocated that there demand not exist a theme song every year.

But with society having had to "adapt to unprecedented circumstances" brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, he idea The Road Ahead "just continued".

"Only time will tell whether or not it has that enduring quality," he said. "In the immediate term, if it can inspire some degree of hope, I retrieve it'due south done its job."

Watch these two episodes of Striking A Chord: The Songs That Made Singapore hither and hither.