ABOUT a year ago, local filmmaker, Royston Tan made a movie called 881 about the quintessentially Singaporean getai shows. The movie broke box office records and smashed some stereotypes about getais.
Today, after covering the getai scene for various stories for the past couple of weeks, I just can’t help but notice how the once gaudy getai shows are now considered rather cool.
Long gone are the days when getai shows are for bored housewives and pot-bellied uncles. Younger people sporting the latest fashion are now making their presence felt at these shows of loud heady music and tacky dance moves.
Take one four-year-old who can barely put on her own shoes.
She arrived at the show all decked out in the necessary outlandish costume and no less than five other family members in tow. Her mum and aunts spoke proudly about how this young starlet has never gotten stagefright and that her music teacher is a veteran getai singer.
Cody Lim gets ready for stage. ST Photo: Desmond Lim
Then it hit me.
Once upon a time, drama lessons were the enrichment activity of choice for parents who secretly hoped that their little ones would snag roles in a well-known touring musical like "The Sound of Music".
Now a growing number of parents are sending their kids to learn singing for 15 minutes of heartland fame on a makeshift getal stage instead.
Look down at the audience from the stage and chances are you will also find a sizeable number of youths tapping their feet to the beats and laughing along at the occasional crude Hokkien jokes.
But really, just like vintage scooters and T-shirts, these shows are definitely making a comeback. Moreever, the average age of the audience is starting to correspond to the ever-dropping age of the child or teen singers.
Throw in a fashionable young movie director like Royston Tan, who is now almost synonymous with getais, and you’ll get a revival in a culture, once shunned by youth.
As for me, I'm off to check the getai schedules for tonight.