RTM Gemilang

I practically grew up listening to RTM’s orchestra. People might say that it was ‘enlightenment’ or something. But in my early teen when all the kids in the neighbourhood were screaming ‘She loves you, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!’, I secretly worked my way through the beauty of ‘Kucupan Azimat’ and ‘Putera Puteri’. I will stop short when P. Ramlee’s ‘Dalam Air Ku Terbayang Wajah’ aired over the radio. And I fell deeply in love with ‘Jauh-Jauh’.

I do jammed with the guys over ‘Ferry ‘cross the Mersey’, ‘House of the Rising Sun’ and ‘Satisfaction’ but my Malay heart could not let those amazing tunes played by so many people with so varied aural textures go away.

So, I almost jumped with joy when last Saturday morning, Dato’ Mokhzaini (the Director of Music/Conductor RTM) invited me to their 50^th Anniversary Gemilang concert as the Orchestra’s Guest. Wowie! Would’ve hugged him if he’s In front of me. Hehe. Dato’ Mokhzaini (DM), to me, is one staunch personality with a golden heart. He is terribly funny too, if you know him that well. He said, you better come … you cannot possibly come when we celebrate our 100^th eh? Hahaha. Many a times my friends from RTM lamented to me about his ‘hair dryer treatment’ ala-Sir Alex. The perpetual tagline in that outfit will always be ‘Shape Up or Ship Out!’. Told them that it’s because he loves you all that much. He has great goals and missions to accomplish for Malaysian music. Would not you think that he is under tremendous pressure with predecessors like Ahmad Merican, Alfonso Soliano, Gus Steyn, Johari Salleh and Oii Eow Jin? All these guys work were out of this world. He also has peers in Ruslan Imam, Hanafi Imam, Jimmy Ali, the late Ishak Ali Muda, etc.  too to keep up.

Beside these, he diversifies the orchestra with ‘outreach’ programmes. Everybody will have the chance to enjoy their music. If you can’t come to us, we shall come to you, he said. Those ‘Refleksi’ program for school ensemble is rather fascinating too. The kids get to perform at shopping complex. Brilliant move that. As for himself, you can catch him performing at Bistros on   some lucky evenings with his trio for pittance. Si, he has so much humility in him.

Then, there I was … celebrating together with the Orchestra that I love so much. Hey, am part of their history, man. Enloying every minute of it. And they played ‘Jauh-Jauh’ with solo from my buddy, that awfully talented Razak Rahman.