Charity Concert

This is my ex.piano teacher, Lee Ching Ching is going to have a charity concert in Mutiara Damansara. She's great I tell you. :)

Charity concert by music students in aid of children’s home

MOVED by the plight of the handicapped and orphans at the Taman Megah Handicapped and Disabled Children’s Home (PPKKCTM), music teacher and lecturer Lee Ching Ching decided to hold a charity concert called Splashes of Musical Colour.

The concert will be held on April 25 at 1.30pm at Wisma Bentley Music, Mutiara Damansara.

Practice makes perfect: Lee (left) overseeing her student Fahim Ikmal Datuk Bahari’s piano practice session. With them are the other students who will be performing at the ‘Splashes of Musical Colour’ concert.

Lee’s students and their friends will be performing a mix of classical pieces by composers like Mendelssohn, Ravel, Grieg, Rachmaninov and Chopin, as well as popular/contemporary numbers like O Solo Mio, Moon River, Shanghai Beach, The Climb (by Miley Cyrus), and a couple of Disney and Broadway songs.

On the concert’s performers, Lee said there were nine pianists, 20 violinists, a flute soloist, a gu-zheng soloist, a choir with more than 30 members, and several vocalists.

The programme includes solo and duet performances for both piano and violin, a string orchestra and choir showcase.

“The students, whose ages range from seven to 62, hail from the Klang Valley, Penang, Taiping, Malacca, Pahang, and even Singapore,” said Lee.

“I pass by the home daily when I send my children to school, and I noticed that many of their children are walking or playing by the road. I found out from the trustee that the children are housed in four homes, and walk to the main centre for their daily meals.

“When I learnt that they planned to build a one-stop centre that would cost about RM6mil, I came up with the idea for a concert to help with the home’s building fund.

Sound of music: The violinists running through their performance ahead of the concert. Below: The choir group in practice.

“I have always wanted to organise a fundraising concert during my 10 years teaching in KL,” said Lee, whose has been teaching for 25 years.

She said the event would offer a chance for her students to do something for the community and be involved in charity work, with a secondary aim of providing a platform for them to build up their confidence as they help organise the event and raise funds.

“If the premises is realised, it will not only benefit the home’s children, but also children from the society as well.

“The latter group can be encouraged to do some social work like tutoring and spending time with the underprivileged, to educate them to have a better appreciation of what they have and not take things for granted.

“It is also an event for the students to showcase their ability and where everybody can have fun,” said the 42-year-old mother of three.

In the course of teaching (both students and music teachers furthering their education) and performing, Lee also hopes to change the public’s perception that teaching music is only taken up when there are no other options.

“I often get parents who request that I groom their children to become music teachers because they do not excel academically.

“It is frustrating to make parents understand that music, like any field, requires intelligence, passion and talent,” she said.

Lee revealed that she was a straight A’s student in her Taiping hometown, but shocked everyone when she chose to further her tertiary education in music and take that up as her career.

She has since written seven books on music, with another on the way, and many of her students have won top scorer awards.

Tickets for the concert are priced at RM30 each.

For tickets and donation details, contact PPKKCTM (Baskin) at 03-7806 1143/ 4261.

All HUIs, if you're interested in this, please move on. Pick up your phone and call. It's so simple. :) I'm going to ask my parents to let me go. :D

Alice