Mint.Music: [Mint.Music.Event] Eco Music Challenge 2013 Grand Finale

Organised by the National Environment Agency (NEA) for the fourth year, the Eco Music Challenge is a national songwriting competition that encourages music talents of all ages to submit original music compositions with the aim of inspiring more people to cherish the environment and conserve resources.

Original songs refers to songs which are written and composed by the band/musicians themselves and not sung anywhere else.

This year, the competition garnered 163 submissions during the call for entry phase which lasted for a month. 12 finalists were shortlisted from the entries and the finalists attended two weeks of mentorship with new mentors including well-known vocal coach John Lee, renowned composer Dick Lee, veteran songwriter Clement Chow, popular local performer Jack Ho, singer-songwriter Shimona Kee and Timbre co-founder Danny Loong. The finalists received training and guidance on their lyrics, music arrangement, instrumentation, vocals and showmanship from these industry veterans.

The winning song of the Eco Music Challenge will become the official theme song for Clean and Green Singapore (CGS) 2014. A music video depicting the aspiration for a Clean and Green Singapore was launched on 26 October 2013 at the CGS 2014 launch carnival. The year-long CGS programme aims to inspire Singaporeans to make a conscious decision and effort to care for and protect the environment by adopting eco-friendly practices as an integral part of their daily lives.

Let's start Eco Music Challenge Grand Finale rolling with a performance by our very own JACK AND RAI!

Our emcees of the day from Yes933 and 987fm:

If you've been listening to the songs of the finalists and like them, you can also get the albums: compilations of songs sung at previous Eco Music Challenge contests.

Each CD cost S$11.90 nett.

*Hurray, Jack's looking my way into my camera!*

The judges and audience are ready!

Here are some highlights of all 12 finalists during their performance~

First group up were my WDA classmates!
Friends playing music together are friends to keep for life.
Congratulations~

I like how when the finalists were performing, the lyrics of their songs were flashed on the plasma TVs located at both sides of the stage. In this way, we could even sing along!

Wait.
Doesn't this guy in grey and a cap look familiar?!
Isn't he Tzire, the Singaporean rapper!

Check out his raps and especially this rap he did about SMRT!

The only mandarin original song of the night:

Not only that, this is the one and only Guzheng performance of the day, performed by none other than Deborah Tan. Remember her?

Debbie's one of the Singapore Blog Award 2013 Best Music blog finalists!
She was also invited to do a Guzheng performance for Karen Mok's Fan and Greet Session in Singapore perviously.

Great to meet you again Debbie!
Thank you for bringing great music to me over and over~

Another finalist, Christiane Mikaela, performing her song titled Lady Earth.
She sang it with her very own vintage mic but it's a pity there wasn't any special effects added to portray the speciality of the mic. Still, her song won the 3rd prize for this challenge.

That's all for the highlights!
It's time to vote for your favourite song and enjoy special performances by 53A as well as Diya Tan while the votes are being tabulated.

Cast your votes into these blue boxes:

My vote, of course, goes to BOX 1 to support my talented classmates!!!

Sara from 53A sings beautifully!
If you haven't heard of 53A, LISTEN NOW and remember 53A!!!

Diya hyping up the crowd as we sang along with her that night.

I'm so proud of Yiyang (the keyboardist whom I've been performing with for the longest time) because together with Hui Shan, they won the Most popular song award!

For the first time, NEA also presented a ‘Special Mention Award’, to S. Gunasegaran and Pichinikkadu Elango for their Tamil submission entitled ‘Nature In You’, due to its lyrics regarded to possess high artistic value.

And you know what, Guna is also one of my WDA classmates!
My class is full of beautiful people (and some weird ones but I love every single one all the same).

Congratulations, Guna!