Remembering Cikgu Yusnor Ef

It was very sad to hear the news that Cikgu Yusnor Ef passed away last week. Yusnor Ef was a veteran composer and lyricist who started his career working with the legendary P. Ramlee and many other great singers, composers and groups. He was a champion of Malay Culture and worked hard to promote, preserve, and celebrate all the great Malay musicians of the past several decades through his books and TV documentaries, as well as helping to get the younger generations involved in music. According to the article in the Straits Times, "He was president and co-founder of Perkamus, the Association of Malay Singers, Composers and Professional Musicians; chairman of the National Arts Council’s Malay Music Development Committee; and had served on the board of directors of the Composers and Authors Society of Singapore (Compass)." When I first visited Singapore in 2010, he was the first person to meet me and show me around. We met in Malay Village (Kampung Melayu) at an outdoor Malay restaurant, and to my surprise he had invited Pop Yeh Yeh legends Zam Zam, Kassim Selamat, and M Ishak that evening as well (photo below). I did my first interviews for my Pop Yeh Yeh documentary with him, and these artists. Soon after that, he introduced me to Osman Ariffin of Life Records, who would end up connecting me with many other Pop Yeh Yeh artists in Malaysia and Singapore. "Cikgu" - meaning honorable teacher, as many called him, truly loved to teach people about the vibrant history of Malay music. I was so lucky to meet him, and honored that he wanted to help me in my goal of preserving the history of 60s singers and groups of Singapore and Malaysia.