The joyful rush of celebrating together after so long is quite universal. As I write, today many parts of Asia are celebrating Songkran New Year, and here in Cambodia, ‘Choul Chnam Thmey’. This year we will finally get the chance to celebrate Eid with our loved ones, especially those of us living away from home, after the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions around the world.
For me I’m really looking forward to celebrating Hari Raya with my Singapore fam this year after a few lonely Ramadans and Syawals, and that has been the inspiration for my latest song, Bertemu di Hari Raya. How special this song is warrants a long post on how it came together. [TLDR: Thank you & enjoy]
You can hear it on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon and many other platforms, and watch the lyric video Bertemu Di Hari Raya on Youtube.
It is my ‘rezeki’ to be in Phnom Penh, and to meet amazing people like Metta Legita who is a superb pianist and composer, through our mutual friend and musical mentor Carrie. It is so refreshing to meet someone of similar cultural background & creative bent, with some (tough) shared experiences.
In quick succession, Metta drafted in her pal Jesse Ricketson who has a wicked recording studio set-up at his traditional wooden house, and bassist Arone Silverman who added a solid backing groove to our tune. As I was singing it felt like I was in a kampung, hot, no aircon, with cats – authentic Raya spirit indeed 😊
The song made it all the way across the world to be mixed by my long-time musical collaborator Michael Tingle in Cornwall, who was super efficient and managed to ‘warm up’ my synthetic drum programming. I also managed to fulfil one of my musical dreams of getting mastered at THE Abbey Road Studios, by Sean McGee who remastered Beatles, Tina Turner etc. In the future, it would be cool to work with local and Nusantara talents too!
In tribute to this beautiful country I’m in, thank you to my local tailor for the beautiful Khmer outfit that can double up as a unique baju Raya. Grateful to the The Den Salon for the army of people doing my hair and makeup and to my friend Ratana who ‘gets it’ and took fab photos during a rare rainy day.
Big thanks to everyone involved in creating the most amazing song I’ve worked on! Enjoy this tune as much as we have had the pleasure of creating it. And please share with your loved ones!
Selamat Hari Raya in advance, dan Maaf Zahir Batin.
