Heartstrings

Karen De Silva is a jazz violinist, composer and educator. Having practised law, she gave up her career to pursue her passion in music, graduating with First Class Honours from Goldsmiths’ College University of London, majoring in jazz performance. Her commitment to the arts and education led Karen to attain a MA in Arts Pedagogy and Practice, where her thesis explored the use of manga as a medium which enables musicians to reconnect with their emotions and express their sense of self. A frequent performer at concerts and outreach programmes, she has performed in Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, Japan, Korea, China, Vietnam and New Zealand. Her performance and composition explorations traverse the acoustic and electric spectrums—incorporating live-looping in recent years—to transmute classical and popular music aesthetics in a multi-genre approach to music-making.

Koh Min Hui joined Singapore Chinese Orchestra (SCO) as a zhongruan musician at the age of 21 right before graduating from the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) with a music degree in 2011. Min Hui was a recipient of the Ngee Ann Kongsi merit award and was the youngest musician in the orchestra at the time.

Min Hui is no stranger to the music industry. Currently, she is the Ruan Principal of the Singapore Ruan Chamber Ensemble and committee member of the Ruanxian Association of Singapore. Min Hui is professionally trained to teach autistic children and has been teaching in Pathlight School since 2014. She is also the newly appointed Ruan instructor for the Singapore National Youth Chinese Orchestra (SNYCO) from January 2020.

Growing up in the music scene, Min Hui started learning zhongruan at the age of eight under the guidance of Xu Yi Ping. She later gained admission to the School of Young Talents at NAFA, where she obtained the Zhongruan Diploma awarded by the Centra Conservatory of China in 2005. Since 2006, Min Hui has been under the tutelage of Zhang Ronghui, Principal of Ruan in SCO.

A multi-award winner, Min Hui was the only Gold Award winner representing Singapore in the professional youth category of the 2010 Inaugural International Ruan Competition organised by China Nationalities Orchestra Society in Beijing. In 2008, she was the first person in history to clinch the first prize in the Zhongruan Open Category of the Singapore Chinese Music Competition.

Vick is a sound designer/artist based in Singapore. Traditionally trained in the cello, he fuses both organic and electronic sonic elements to create textural soundscapes. His works are influenced by the genres of minimalism, electronica and ambient, creating a space for organic and electronic elements to co-exist.

He is a part of Canvas Conversations, an electronic ambient quartet that won the Noise Singapore Award in 2015. They have also performed for Singapore Biennale 2016 and Mosaic Music Series 2017 at the Esplanade.

After graduating from Lasalle College of the Arts in 2015—specializing in Music Technology—he went on to design for dance, film and theatre. In 2019, he was nominated for Best Sound Design for The Straits Times Life Theatre Awards for The Watching (Toy Factory Productions).

Being heavily involved in theatre for young audiences, his compositions have been featured in works such as In Search of You (The Kueh Tutus), When Sadness Comes to Call (MySuperFuture Theatrical Productions) and The Dragon’s Dentist and Us from Esplanade’s PLAYtime series.

Some of his recent sound design work include Kwa Geok Choo (Toy Factory Productions), See You Anniversary (Nine Years Theatre), Hutan (2022 AWESOME Festival, Perth) and Windward Side of the Mountain (SCCC Cultural Extravaganza 2022).