5 Days, 5 Perspectives: The Stories You Didn't See at VOTW 2026

A festival is made up of more than just the moments on stage.

Behind every performance are countless stories — the last-minute fixes, coffee runs, missing risers, countless footsteps between venues, friendships made backstage, and moments that reminded us why we do what we do.

For Voices of the World 2026, we invited five members of the VOS community to share the festival through their own eyes. From a festival manager racing against the clock, to a singer sharing the stage with friends across borders, to a first-time team member experiencing her first major festival — these are the stories you didn't see.

Here's our festival, told one diary at a time.

Day 1 — Gabriel Ching, Festival Manager

7.00am Good morning! Coffee, breakfast and let's go.

We'd arrived at Capitol and we’re getting ready to move all our logistics over to CHIJMES.

9.00am. The movers arrived.

We started counting risers.

"...Why do we only have 16 instead of 21?"

Cue a brief moment of panic.

After some detective work, we traced the missing five risers to someone we'd lent them to back in December 2025. They'd completely forgotten to return them. Thankfully, our trusty movers came to the rescue and helped retrieve them in time.

Crisis averted.

10.00am. Premium Economy legroom officially downgraded to Budget. We needed to squeeze in more people and suddenly every centimetre mattered.

By 11.00am, setup was finally complete.

This year, we brought back printed programme booklets for our audiences. They looked great... although every time I handed one out, all I could think was, please donate, these were expensive to print.

Lunch arrived around 12.30pm — some kind of fusion cuisine yum! Then came soundchecks.

Soul Sounds and Gondwana filled the hall with music, but one of our atmospheric microphones turned out to be blocking part of the choreography. Out it went. Sometimes the simplest solution really is the best one.

At 3.00pm, Performance Exchange 1 began.

One small issue. The choirs had brought more singers than originally declared.

The centre section quickly filled up, so some singers ended up with side-view seats. Thankfully, we found little windows between the pillars where they could still see the stage. Somewhere in the middle of it all, I also found myself becoming a human microphone stand.

By 8.00pm, Feature Concert 1 was completely full.

The hall buzzed with excitement as audiences packed in for the opening concert. Curie and I somehow became unofficial Nin Jiom ambassadors, handing out herbal candies to grateful singers and audience members alike. Safe to say, they disappeared very quickly.

11.00pm. Time to pack everything up again and move logistics to tomorrow's venue.

Goodnight.

Day 2 — Daniel Goh, Artistic Coordinator

Day 2 was music video filming day.

Before the cameras even started rolling, my morning began with an airport run to pick up the Kuala Lumpur Children's Choir. Later that evening, I'd be back at the airport again for the Hong Kong Children's Choir.

Between those two trips, we somehow filmed a music video featuring seven international choirs across two locations in Enabling Village – just imagine the amount of walking we did that day. 

Our team took turns chaperoning choirs between holding rooms, filming locations and a makeshift recording studio we'd assembled for the day. Watching everything come together reminded me of my days studying media production. After months of planning, seeing each scene finally come to life was incredibly satisfying.

At one point, the rain arrived, forcing us to pause everything.

For a while, it felt like we were racing both the weather and the clock.

Yet somehow, everything fell perfectly into place. Even the final choir to land in Singapore made it in time for filming.

The hectic day was contrasted with the calm, unhurried night of Feature Concert 2, featuring the Kuala Lumpur Children’s Choir and Thailand Children’s Choir. Their sweet, innocent voices beckoned us to slow down and enjoy the music after a bustling day!

It was exactly the ending the day needed.

Day 3 — Elise Koh, VOS Choral Scholar

Today was Day 3 of Voices of the World.

When I slipped into my familiar black concert dress this morning, I was clueless of the euphoria that was about to fill my heart with more love than I could ever imagine.

Watching other incredibly talented choirs from all over the world was nothing short of breathtaking, auditorially no doubt, but emotionally too. When all I saw on the faces of every choir was pure passion, each smile and frown genuine to the core, it hit me that while we all sing from different parts of the world, one thing we will always have in common is authentically singing for the love of music. 

I was already so honoured to share a stage with them, let alone have a chance to meet the souls behind the performers. Nothing, however, prepared me for the finale.

As we sang We Are the World, my world suddenly became a sea of lights and voices. I remember thinking, "I don't think it gets any better than this."

In that moment, music didn't feel like something we were performing. Holding the hands of my new friends from both Thailand and New Zealand, all I felt was an undiluted love for music and humanity that extended far beyond the borders of any country. 

Tonight, I'm lying in bed scrolling through all the photos from the day, trying to find the perfect one that captures how it felt.

Ironically, I keep stopping at the blurry ones. The ones filled with laughter. The ones taken halfway through a joke.

The imperfect photos somehow hold the memories most perfectly.

Today filled my heart in ways words probably never will.

Day 4 — Nicole Lee, VOS Ladies Choir

Day 4 somehow felt like the day I learned the most.

My morning started with a workshop led by Lyn Williams. Hearing about Gondwana Choirs' commitment to celebrating Australia's diverse cultures and stories through choral music was incredibly inspiring. In many ways, it reminded me of Singapore too — a multicultural society where music can become a way of preserving heritage while bringing people together.

The workshop was not just about listening either. We got to learn an Acehnese dance from Murtala, who is Acehnese himself, so it really was authentic learning in every sense. It took my brain a while to catch up with the choreography, but it was so much fun. I also gained a whole new level of respect for the performers as my knees were aching just watching them move so quickly and precisely!

Next stop, the Friendship Concert soundcheck.

This was the first time all the participating choirs heard one another's pieces in full, and every choir brought something completely different to the stage. I found myself wishing we'd had more opportunities throughout the festival to simply sit, listen and get to know one another through our music. One particularly heartwarming moment came when my friend, Apple Joyce, unexpectedly reunited with a childhood friend through the HKICF Teachers' Choir. Festivals really do make the world feel a little smaller.

After a very rushed lunch, I headed straight into Sanders Lau's Hong Kong Music Reading Session. As someone who doesn't speak Cantonese, I found it surprisingly approachable. We even had a crash course in Cantonese pronunciation—which I absolutely butchered—but it made singing the repertoire so much more meaningful. It was also fascinating to discover works by Hong Kong composers, and not all of them were in Cantonese, making them accessible to choirs from all over the world.

Before long, it was time for the Friendship Concert with the HKICF Teachers' Choir, VOS City Chorus and VOS Ladies Choir. By the finale, we'd somehow managed to fill every single row of risers. Looking out across the stage at that sea of singers was a sight I'll never forget.

Singing under three different conductors in one evening was such a treat. Each brought something unique to the music and I came away having learnt so much from all of them.

By the end of the night, the festival had finally caught up with me. I was exhausted and feeling unwell, so instead of joining everyone for the after-hours celebrations, I headed home to rest.

Sometimes that's part of festival life too.

Day 5 — Iffah Qamilia, Marketing Team

The final day of Voices of the World 2026 also happened to be my very first day as a full-time member of the VOS team.

After spending almost a year here as an intern, it felt strangely fitting that my first official day would also be the festival's last. I've always joked that I was a double agent between marketing and partnerships.

Over the past few days, I'd traded Canva for front-of-house duties at our Gala and Feature Concerts, swapping design files for guest lists, ushering and welcoming audiences.

Before everything began, there was one important stop to make. A quick two-minute walk from CHIJMES to Raffles City for a large teh-o peng from Ya Kun.

As I watched the kids and youths in their ethnic outfits take turns rehearsing, I could not help but feel a sense of pride although I’ve only observed them from afar. Even with close to zero choral knowledge, they remind me that you don’t need to fully understand something to be moved by it. 

After a quick post-dinner lip gloss touch-up, the doors opened for our final Feature Concert.

Audience members slowly filled the hall. One last concert. One last applause. One final rendition of We Are the World.

As the last notes faded and singers embraced one another, it didn't feel like an ending.

It felt like the kind of goodbye that quietly promises, "We'll see each other again." And somehow, that felt exactly right.