When the Singapore Symphony Orchestra was formed in 1979, it was unthinkable that a young nation preoccupied with economic growth and job creation would devote attention and resources to setting up a national orchestra.

My earliest memory of playing with the SSO was when we did Lalo’s Symphonie Espagnole with Lan Shui conducting sometime back in the 1990s.

I have been lucky enough to be playing regularly with the SSO for more years than I care to remember. It is a terrific orchestra, full of energy and enthusiasm, and playing at a consistently high level. The atmosphere is friendly and wonderfully alive; many is the time that the vitality of the orchestra has shaken me out of a jet-lagged trance.

Music is all about sharing experiences and memories. Over the last 25 years, in no less than 10 musical collaborations with the magnificent Singapore Symphony Orchestra, every such occasion has been celebrated with profound joy.

I have so many great memories from my nine years with the SSO, but what comes to mind first of all are some of the very special people I got to work with, in addition to the amazing musicians and office colleagues.

Forty years is a significant landmark, particularly in the Singaporean context. After all, few national orchestras internationally can offer that their existence traces the transformations across almost 80% of their nation’s independent history.

I remember thinking at my very first Babies Proms rehearsal in 2002, “Would these extraordinary musicians be willing to support me in my lifelong quest to make the first experience of very young children hearing a full symphony orchestra so positive, that they could not wait to return? Would the people in charge of the orchestra allow children to conduct the orchestra, and even come on stage as the orchestra played?”

The SSO celebrates 40 years of presenting classical music to Singapore in January 2019, at the bicentennial of the founding of Singapore. And the best thing that can ever happen in this time is the contribution by Music Director Lan Shui. In 22 years, he raised the SSO from being an orchestra searching for an identity to being what can be arguably described as the best orchestra in Asia today.

When the SSO was founded 40 years ago, it transformed the cultural landscape and the lives of many people in Singapore. My life was changed when the SSO and Maestro Choo Hoey offered me a scholarship for further studies in London.

The SSO has had the privilege of sharing the love of music through frequent community events, held at the Victoria Concert Hall and other community spaces around Singapore.

My husband and I first moved from New York to Singapore over 20 years ago, in 1994. A newcomer to the city, I decided to join a coffee session with fellow expat ladies.

The 24th of January 1979 was a milestone for Singapore and nine-year-old me. For Singapore, it was the birth of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra. For me, it was the first time I attended a live symphony orchestra concert, an event that would influence the rest of my life.

On 24 January 1979, at age nine, I was nervously tagging along with my Australian music teacher and two other boys as we reached the Singapore Conference Hall before 7pm – way too early and by sacrificing our fun time in the football field.

When my husband John was transferred to Singapore with HSBC in 1982 we didn’t realise we were about to embark on the happiest, most exciting period of our lives abroad!

Working at the Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC), I was involved in the “OB” (Outside Broadcast) recordings of SSO concerts at the Victoria Concert Hall between May 1987 and February 1992, for SBC’s Radio 5. We’d record the SSO concert on Friday night, then broadcast it the following Thursday.