Teresa Tseng at Health & Wellness Expo 27 Jan 2008 Photographs and Report

I arrived at the Singapore Expo Hall 6B around 11.30am and I was browsing the various stalls and eventually settling down at the stage area to watch DongFa Billy giving a talk about healthcare and demonstrating how to cook healthy food using some powerful blender, which he is currently promoting. Photographs of those will be up in a separate blog post.

Teresa appeared onstage at around 12.50pm, 20 minutes later than the scheduled time because there was some delay on programme schedule. I'll do the commentary, photo-by-photo and the final performance commentary at the end of this blog post.

Teresa interacting with the emcee on the stage before her performance of the three songs. I am very pleased with her because she has learnt to put her hands behind her back (the posture is more respectful to the emcee and presentable onstage). She's a very fast learner.
Notice Teresa is always facing the emcee and looking at her directly in the eye, this is actually very polite of her because she is not distracted by the audience and concentrates on answering the emcee's questions. An example of good emcee interaction skills.
Teresa started her first song 飞行部落 by F.I.R The crew was nice enough to add those special moving lights for effects. Good thing because it warmed up the stage. Bad thing because it screwed up the lighting of my pictures. Hahaha.
Yes, Teresa was actually dancing abit for this song because it was necessary according to the genre of the song. Big mega-watt smile and much smoother gesticulation makes the song enjoyable. The downside was that the song's background music was a little too loud. I was tempted to go to the sound crew and requested them to tone it down abit but I decided against it. Taking the photos was much more important.
More gesticulation and gentle swaying. Teresa's movements were not so large as her previous renditions of the same song and that was because she had another studio appointment after the expo performance. I suppose it was wise to conserve some energy to make sure she could optimize all her celebrity appointments.
Teresa did not speak during the song interval because the music was simply too loud but I suppose she did what she could keeping the beat and posing for the photographers who were standing on her right hand side downstage.

Could not capture her facial expression. But I think she was smiling to the photograpers snapping away. As usual, many were whipping out their camera phones after hearing how good she sounded live onstage. From age 8 to age 80, nobody flinched at the audience area because they were really captivated by her crystal-clear singing. I was moving around because I wanted to capture Teresa from as many angles as possible.
Teresa is preparing for her second song 月牙湾 by F.I.R again. This is currently one of the most difficult songs on the Mandarin pop market and requires alot of pre-performance preparation. Teresa did not underestimate the song either and hence the concentration in the semi-dark interval.
Teresa is now tackling the song, which attracted even more people to the audience area because they all knew it was a difficult song to sing live onstage.
Teresa remembers to move around onstage. I caught her in motion in this photograph, which makes it look as if she was skipping from point to point. Hahaha..She was actually walking from right to left.

The challenge of the song was to be able to reach and sustain the falsetto at the chorus portion in style and Teresa did not disappoint. Pitch-perfect, hitting the necessary notes without breaking a sweat. A quick look around the audience area showed nods of approval and admiration. She is one impressive singer indeed.
Towards the end of the second song, Teresa was nice enough to pose for me. Teresa had already noticed me around but I did not wave back because I did not want to distract her from the difficult songs onstage and I also did not want to give away my position to the people there. There was actually a camera pointing in my direction, which made waving way too obvious.
Teresa is now singing her third and final song 随爱而飞 by Cass Phang. It's not an easy song either and required a decent build-up to sound convincing. A good choice of song because most of the audience are middle-aged, which makes the song very familiar to the listeners.
I could not resist taking a shot of the two projector screens beside the stage because the images, though blurred, were large. This one shows Teresa connecting with the song at hand.
Teresa continues to remember to sing to the audience (not at the audience), which is actually a key to sustainable performances. As I said, she is a fast learner since her nascent days during Campus Superstar Season 1. For those who are not familiar with Teresa, she was the Female Champion For Campus Superstar 2006, out of a total of 4,000 contestants.

She looks great in her outfit today - white silken top, with a semi-transparent lace front, well-tailored jeans and in one of those rare occasions, let her long hair down. The emcee was full of praise about how beautiful and slender Teresa looked onstage.
After the thumbs-up I quietly gave Teresa after the second performance, I signalled to Teresa again seconds after this shot was taken. The reason: I felt that Teresa was facing the right hand side audience more often and was a little neglecting the left hand side audience. Using military handsigns, I managed to communicate to her discreetly from downstage. She looked puzzled for a second, gave it a three-second thought, and started facing the right hand side audience as advised.
Although the hand signal was given in the middle of the third song, Teresa was apt enough to make a decision onstage and followed accordingly. Let me say this a third time for emphasis sake: She is a fast learner.
Of course, as she reallocates her facing time onstage, I continued taking photographs, moving from angle to angle to try and get some decent shots from my lousy camera phone. Hahaha.

A new shot of Teresa from the right hand side as she faces the left hand side audience. Way to go, girl!
Gesticulation continues on during the song and it is important because it is stage performance, not studio recording session so both audio and visual entertainment are equally important.
The photographers love Teresa because she looks good onstage, anywhere and gives stellar performances everytime. Evidence? See that guy? He whipped out his massive camera and started snapping like crazy, holding steadily all the way until the end of Teresa's third song.
After the end of all three songs, the emcee refused to let Teresa go offstage and caught her on to ask Teresa more about her personal life, on how she manages to juggle schoolwork, personal life and celebrity life. Teresa answered gracefully and kept up the sense of humour from the emcee. Another point for the girl for quick thinking and interactive ability!
The final photograph before I went off as the emcee continued a few more questions on what sort of Chinese New Year goodies Teresa likes. The answer: She does not eat Chinese New Year goodies. Hahaha. Why did I go off? Because the emcee was pointing at Teresa's mother, whom I must greet out of courtesy and ettiquette since I already know her.

It was only a quick chat with Mdm Tseng because Teresa was about to go offstage. Here's what was exchanged:

曾夫人~~
嗨！
好久不见了！近来还好吗？

还好还好！
近日只跟Thomas联络，没机会和您联络聊聊。

嗯，年底公司比较忙，所以都在忙着。

我明白。

今天只有你一个人吗？其它人呢？

哦，我先到场，所以没看到。他们可能还在后头。

(Teresa started going offstage towards us.)

好了，我们得走了，她还得到电台那儿去录影呢。新年快乐！

曾夫人，新年快乐！

(Teresa is now within two metres of us but is heavily surrounded by the expo security and MediaCorp personnel who was accompanying her)

Without wanting to appear in public, I gave a quick wave to the girl who smiled before vanishing into the audience who was surging up to have a closer look at our Teresa, giving me the perfect cover. Thus, there was no time for exclusive photographs because from there onwards, Teresa was quickly escorted out of the hall and into the transport whilst I had to rush off to another part of the island again.

Note To Teresa herself:

咏霖，

今天唱得好！尤其是《月牙湾》，看来下了不少功夫。

记得我曾跟你提的：要均衡地分配面对观众的时间。

彭羚的《随爱而飞》开头有点抢拍，要注意喔！

保重，摄影完后，好好修息吧！

That's it. End the report.