Conversation with Lim Han Quan, Senior Section Grand Prix Winner of Electone Festival 2022

Han Quan, besides the Electone, do you play any other music instruments?

I started out with the piano when I was 6 and took up Electone after I finished my ABRSM Grade 8 Piano during my secondary school days. Through a recommendation from a Japanese Electone masterclass teacher, I also took up drum kit a few years back, not just to try out a non-keyboard instrument, but also in conceptualising and creating more idiomatic and natural drum kit rhythms on the Electone.
I have also just completed my Rockschool Grade 5 drum kit exam last June.

Though I spend much more time with the Electone than the piano or drum kit currently, I still make it a point to revisit the instruments once in a while to keep up with my technique. I hope to clear the Rockschool Grade 8 drum kit exam one day! But that will be after much practice and familiarity with the instrument.

Why was the Electone selected as your major instrument?

I love the Electone for its all-rounded capabilities, as a performance instrument, an educating tool, and a composing canvas. Through learning the Electone, it has helped me tremendously in increasing the capacity of my ’sound bank’ I use for composing and arranging, and for explaining certain concepts to performance and composition students.

At the same time, as a practicing musician, we are taught to appreciate the importance and power of ‘live’ music. The Electone fuses ‘live’ performance and sampled music together, and on top of that, gives me the opportunity to showcase composer and performer simultaneously with a single instrument! This distinctive position and allure is what captivated me, and it still continues to inspire me every time I hear great music and sounds on the Electone.

Which Yamaha courses did you attend, and what is your opinion of the Yamaha Music Education System?

For my Yamaha journey, I first started with the then-called Junior Music Course (now Yamaha Junior Course), and have completed the Senior Special Advanced Course (majoring in piano) ten years back. After that, I moved on to the Yamaha Higher Electone Course and Yamaha Drum Course. I hope to return back to being a student in the Yamaha Drum Course someday!

I have always maintained that the courses in the Yamaha Music Education System have an extremely well thought out, robust progression. Graduates at the end-point of each stream leave with not just technical ability, but also with a confident, assured level of musicianship and communication. It is my wish that Yamaha Music School will continue to enhance its unique standing in the future, to produce students with all-rounded skills and more importantly, what it means to be a musician.