By Zhu Ruixi (17S06B), Chairperson of CLDCS
Raffles CLDCS (Chinese Literacy Drama Cultural Society) is a performing arts CCA. Containing three sections – Chinese drama, songwriting and calligraphy – CLDCS strives to promote Chinese culture and identity within RI through three areas drama, mandarin song-writing, calligraphy, and creative literary script-writing, as well as provide opportunities for our members to showcase their talents.
Photo from annual production 翠谷回响 2016
For Chinese drama section, weekly drama lessons are conducted by our experienced instructor Mr David Wong. Our CCA sessions usually start off with warm up activities, followed by drama playwriting challenges and acting challenges. Besides practical activities, theory lessons on playwriting and acting skills are also great takeaways for students. Members here are full of creativity and always throw themselves into intense conversation and sharing ideas.
Our songwriting group gathers students who are enthusiastic about mandarin songwriting. Songwriting members are versatile in the different components of songwriting, including composing, lyrics-writing, singing, song arranging and more. During CCA sessions, our external instructor, Mr Keith, will give members trainings on composing skills and theory lessons, where one can easily catch up with even without any music background. Songwriting section creates a conducive environment for members to also have small group discussions to explore Chinese language by crafting lyrics. With talents of our members and the aid from our external instructor, Mr Keith, we aim to create original compositions of mandarin pop, rock and even oriental styles.
And for the calligraphy section, our members enjoy the opportunity to learn from each other the skills for different brushstrokes and sharing ideas about the culture and history of Chinese characters.
Thanking the audience members.
As for the highlights and achievements, the annual production, Cui Gu Hui Xiang(翠谷回响), a long-standing tradition for decades, is our most important event every year. It is an event to showcase our members’ achievements over the year, including one to two full-fledged drama plays, a series of originally composed Chinese songs and a display of calligraphy works.
At a joint VIA event, collaborating with the Y1-4 Chinese Cultural Club.
Besides that, both drama and songwriting sections have many invitations from both school and external organizations. For example, we performed for Chinese New Year Celebration, National Day Celebration, Migrant Workers Appreciation Day, Racial Harmony Day, Singapore Discovery Center 20th Anniversary and so on. Our latest drama production, Majulah Singapura, was a great hit at 2016 National Day Celebration. In 2016 we also received invitation from Singapore Discovery Center for the first time because of the popularity of our original songs.
After the 2016 National Day Performance
Although there are three sections in CLDCS, our members of all sections emerge strongly bonded by having inter-section activities and bonding times, especially after our annual performance held in May every year.
The conducive ambience for exchange of ideas on traditional and popular Chinese culture has made our CCA not only stick to the traditional values of Chinese culture but also explore newer values from the younger generation and infuse them into our creation of songs, play scripts and calligraphy works.
