Sabah band emerges third in Japan
Kota Kinabalu: All the hard work and sacrifices have finally paid off for Poseidon, a Sabahan band, when they emerged one of the top three bands at the Asian Beat 2016 band competition, in Tokyo, Japan, recently.
The Kota Kinabalu-based band won third place through ‘Ontoros Antanom’, a song composed by its vocalist Kaynizam Maskor, against seven other bands from Asia, Europe and North America.
“Poseidon was formed this year and comprises six music enthusiasts from Kota Kinabalu, Tuaran and Papar.
“Apart from me, the other band members are Hasdee Nurikhwan Jalil who plays the guitar, Ramzul Ihsan Ab Rahman (drum), Mohd Alhafiz Basri (keyboard), Isam Dion Ismail (bass) and Abdul Muis Mushadi (flute).
“We started off by joining the Yamaha Band Mentor 2016 organised by Yamaha Malaysia by sending a video clip and luck was on our side as ‘Ontoros Antanom’ was selected to go to the next phases and eventually we won the competition,” he said when contacted on Tuesday.
By winning the Yamaha Band Mentor Malaysia 2016, Poseidon received a ticket to represent the country to the Asian Beat 2016 which was held in Tokyo, Japan on Nov 5.
“We decided to perform ‘Ontoros Antanom’ once again for the grand finals as the song is unique where it tells a story of the legendary Murut warrior apart from the traditional music elements which we infused into the song through the sounds of ‘Bungkau’ and flute.
“The idea for the song came from our own awareness on the uniqueness of Sabah and its culture.
“We are also excited to make the State and the country proud by grabbing the third place after competing with seven other acts from various countries in the competition.”
The competition was won by Gift from South Korea while in second place was leMeow from Canada.
The other competitors were Sabi Band from Indonesia, Bad Ditch (Singapore), Li Ji (China), Koralli (Ukraine) and Sugar Bro (Hong Kong).
Poseidon brought home a voucher for US$1,000 worth of Yamaha musical instruments while the winner and the first runner-up received a US$3,000 voucher and a US$1,500 voucher, respectively.
“Money was the greatest challenge for us as we have invested a lot throughout the competition, especially for the preparations as we had to go through full scale practise sessions… we had to rent a studio every day, plus we had to upgrade our instruments as well.
“All these are not cheap and we would like to thank (Youth and Sports Minister) Datuk Tawfiq Abu Bakar Titingan and (Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister) Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun for their support,” said Kaynizam.
He disclosed that the band is in the midst of completing their debut album and that they will tour with Yamaha Music Malaysia in East Malaysia, starting with Kuching before proceeding to Kota Kinabalu and Sandakan.
“We hope to penetrate the Asian as well as the international market in future and bring the Sabah elements in our music to another level,” he said.
Asian Beat is one of the biggest amateur band contests held throughout many regions in Asia.
It started out from local competitions in participating countries and regions where each winner at these competitions proceeds to the grand finals to perform together on the same stage and compete to be the top of amateur bands in Asia.
Yamaha Corporation started the event as Band Alert in 1998, prior to renaming it as Asian Beat in 2001.
In the past years, international famous musicians were the judges such as Nathan East, Wes Borland, Tommy Aldridge, Sonny Emory, Billy Sheehan, James LoMenzo and Akira Jimbo.
Source: Daily Express
