Lio Kuokman
School of Music Graduate (2003)
Lecturer (Screenwriting and Creative Development), School of Film and Television
I have a deep attachment with the Academy.
I was born and raised in Macau. But I was blessed to be brought to Hong Kong to study music which kickstarted my professional career.
We have an annual music competition in Macau. There was a year when one of the judges was Prof. Gabriel Kwok, the Head of Keyboard Studies from HKAPA at the time. We had a grand prize at the end of the competition which Prof Kwok would identify one from a number of young contestants to learn the piano from him in Hong Kong, and he chose me to enrol in the Junior Music Programme.
I can still vividly recall my first day of class with Prof. Kwok in Hong Kong. In the Saturday morning, I remembered walking from the Wanchai MTR station and seeing HKAPA from afar. I actually stopped on the way to tell myself, “I must work hard because this is such a valuable chance for me”
For 2 years during secondary school, I had been travelling to Hong Kong on weekends for piano classes and going back to Macau for school on weekdays. I was really excited to learn at HKAPA because at that time, Macau didn’t have much music activities. When I was in Hong Kong, not only did I start from 9am to 6pm to take a full-day course, but also at night, I watched orchestra performances of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra before returning to Macau. To me, Saturday was the most anticipated day of the week.
After I graduated from high school, I continued to study at HKAPA. I stayed for 5 years with lots of cherished memories. The most memorable must be competing for a practice room early in the morning. There were many practice rooms with piano but only a few were the piano students’ favourite. You see, piano students are particularly picky. Once they have a chosen piano, then it’ll be their only choice – and also others’ only choice. That’s why very early in the morning, waking up at 6, I’d rush to the Academy to sign my name on the booking form. I often met a couple students like me there. At the end, I found myself losing to them because it was too tiring. Then, I decided to let go of the morning slots and practice at night instead. I started to practice feverously until late every night, often until 2am or 3am before I returned home.
I believe If you want to pursue music, or arts in general, you must expect hardship and expect to fall from obstacles. It is because without the experience of falling down and rising up, you won’t really grow up.
I wasn’t the top in the class. It was OK that I didn’t start as early. But if others would practice for 4 hours, then I would do 8 hours. During those few years, I was really practising a lot. It helped me to build a solid foundation which prepared me to further study and develop my career in the US and Europe