My, my
Oh the feelin'
Of the sound
Precious and real and
Ooo that's nice
Whip up some steamin' jazz
The pot is on the stove
It's cookin'
Want some more
We always save some
Art nouveau
For special patrons
You look nice
Do you believe in jazz…

-- Soul Food To Go (music: Djavan, lyrics:Doug Figer)

The-cool-kid developed an “addiction” to Karaoke after I brought him along to a gathering with my friends sometime ago.  He even preferred karaoke-ing to going to cinema when Ice Age 3 was showing. Though he has yet to appreciate karaoke’s esoteric raison d'être as he keeps the microphone to himself.

2004 Ig Nobel Peace Prize : Daisuke Inoue of Hyogo, Japan, for inventing karaoke, thereby providing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other.

Ig Nobel Prize winners at improbable.com

It doesn’t matter as I can’t sing. I think I am permanently scarred by  a friend’s remark on my singing years ago. “Noel, you sound jazzy.” Had it been a compliment or a mockery, a less offensive way to point out I had just been out of tune? I’d wondered and decided it had been the latter.

Even so, I had been obliged to sing in every Independence day celebration when I grew up. “Contribute!” I had been told, as no one had come forward to take the task. They apparently had had more common sense than I had…

I’d wondered what singing has got to do with Independence day. Or with anything, as people seem to resort to singing  for almost everything. Got broken-hearted? Sing! Disaster strikes? Sing grievance and sorrow (and do nothing real to help)! Ramadhan? Sing praises and wails in self-pity and self-importance! Lebaran? I bet singing performances would dominate the celebration! And it doesn’t help either that the lyrics has less style and lesser substance.

Hmm… We’ve been crowded with sounds, coherent or incoherent. I think it’s time we should promote “silence”. Music is after all an organised sound and silence.