Pocketful of mercies

Like many of the members of my generation, she was my Lamaze teacher as I got ready to birth my firstborn child Kimi Fernandez. When I was pregnant with my second two years later, Mercy Fabros gave me pointers to remember the breathing and relaxation exercises we had studied before that saw me through a quick labor and delivery.

She was also my breastfeeding coach along with members of the Gabay at Kalinga ng mga Ina (fellow Paulinians Meran Daza Umali, Connie Estrada Calimon). Such was her commitment to the Our Bodies Ourselves movement that I was so infected with wanting to give my daughters nothing but breast milk in their early years. I practiced tandem nursing. I weaned each child from the breast at age three. It got to the point that Gilda Cordero Fernando asked me, "What else are you doing when you're not busy being a cow?" Mercy was in that phase of my life quietly supportive.

As she was when it was Kimi's turn to carry her child Kai to full term. After an uneventful birth, Mercy and I referred to Kai by the possessive OUR apo. It was at this point nine years ago when we became closer. She was a regular paying supporter of Pablo Tariman's intimate concert series at the former Kiss the Cook Gourmet on Maginhawa Street and later at Balay Kalinaw, UP Diliman. At the end of each event, she'd inquire, again in that concerned way of hers, if the concert organizer broke even. Most times, he didn't, but he'd reassure her, "Life is beautiful."

She became part of what I called the opera barkada, a group of retired and semi-retired friends that enjoyed the classics, mostly performed at the Ayala Museum lobby. Usually coming from the Diliman campus, she took the MRT to SM Makati, then walked towards the museum. Or she'd take the Point to Point bus to and fro. Such was her enviable stamina--this woman who was part of a walking group also around the UP Oval.

At the end of the Mario Lanza recital produced by Joseph Uy and Al Andres Andres at Ayala Museum. Seated is soprano Stephanie Anne Gastrock Aguilar. Standing from left: the two Jennys, Jenny Juan and Jenny Llaguno, Marne Kilates, Babeth, Nympha Sano, Mercedes Fabros, Grace Banez, Melendre Araos and Gabriel Allan Ferros Paguirigan. At the back is tenor Mher U. Nival.

At the closing rites of Dame Nelly Miricioiu-Kirk 2015 masterclass at the Ayala Museum. From left: Mercedes Fabros, Jenny Juan, Nelly and Babeth trying the open back position earlier demonstrated by the diva.

Fortieth day following the death of sculptor Jerry Araos at the Garden of Two Dragons in Antipolo City. Seated: Babeth, Bani Lansang and Princess Nemenzo. Standing are Stef Sano, Steve B. Salonga, Victor Corpus, Pablo Tariman and Mercedes Fabros.

That rare occasion when Mercy Fabros wore eye shadow as a nod to the costume party/ball that marked the vernissage of Gilda Cordero Fernando's 2014 show "Same Difference: Ganon pa din ang diperensya" at Silverlens Galleries. From left: Anna Leah Sarabia, Mercedes Fabros, Babeth and Rolly Fernandez

Mercedes Fabros (right) could be counted on to turn up at friends' milestones, in this case Sinag De Leon's and Babeth's joint art exhibit in November 2018 at Gourmet Gypsy Art Cafe. From left: Anna Leah Sarabia, Sheila Nicolas, Bobbie Malay, Virginia Moreno, Melendre Araos, Fe Mangahas, Barbara Mae Dacanay, Jenny Juan, Sinag and Mercy.

Post-intimate concert at Balay Kalinaw. Mercedes Fabros lent her presence again. From left are Lorna Kalaw Tiro, Anna Leah Sarabia, Neni Sta Romana Cruz, Ivi Avellana Cosio, Maria Karina Africa Bolasco and Sheila Coronel. I am seated with Mercy's eldest grandchild Alon.

From March 9 to 11 of 2015, we sat together at an Ayala Museum function room as Romanian-British diva Nelly Miricioiu-Kirk conducted a masterclass for Filipino singers. Mercy explained, over lunch at Dulcinea's to which she treated me, why she was present for consecutive days after seeing Dame Nelly already perform at the Meralco Theater, "This is my birthday gift to myself." We both believed Nelly was not just an excellent vocal coach but a practical life coach for people like us.

Furthermore, we witnessed with our eyes and ears the big difference the singers made once they went through the hands of Nelly.

Mercy's death is still weighing a ton on me, a mere mortal who can't be brave in the face of loss. The tears I cried earlier have stopped, but the mourning hasn't. The months April and May have been personally cruel as one friend after another was stricken and called home. Home to where "mercies are new every morning."

Keeping 'La Traviata Exposed' real

Music and stage director Camille Lopez Molina

After a lull of three years, the Verdi opera La Traviata returns onstage on Oct. 26 at 6:30 p.m. at the Ayala Museum in Makati City. The reason? "Basically because the right voices for it are there," said Camille Lopez Molina, music and stage director.

The story of Violetta, a courtesan, her ardent suitor Alfredo and his interfering father Giorgio may be a tale as old as time, but it has something to say in the 21st century with the rising incidence of HIV AIDS. The subject of a prostitute with a heart of gold may no longer be "as touchy as it was in Verdi’s time," Lopez Molina observed, "but certainly the issues that made it a sensitive subject still exist: prostitution, class discrimination, sexism."

Anna Migallos as Violetta

Nomher Nival as Alfredo

Asked how she tweaked the opera, which features soprano Anna Migallos, tenor Nomher Nival and bass baritone Noel Azcona with the Viva Voce Ensemble, and why the word "exposed" was added to the title, she answerd, "La Traviata Exposed is just refocusing attention from production aspects--costumes, sets, orchestra, personalities--back to the opera itself (music, text, voices). It serves a two-way purpose which resonates deeply with me. One, to give the singers, a chance to vocally, musically and emotionally connect with the opera--keep it real, so to speak--and two, by doing so, help the audience gain a deeper connection, a more truly ‘up close and personal’ experience of opera itself, not the spectacle of it. Give them a reason to want more of the music, not just the show. Granted, it is a theatrical art form, but the ‘theater’ aspect of it stems directly from the music and the text. Just because we don’t have a full production doesn’t mean we can’t have the full emotional experience of the opera."

For tickets, call Ticketworld at 891-9999 or the Cultural Arts Events Organizer at tel. nos. 782-7164, 0918-3473027 and 0920-9540053. Tickets at Php 1,000, Php 700 (for senior citizens), Php 500 and Php 300 (for students).

Photos from the Facebook accounts of Lopez Molina, Migallos and Nival

‘Cosi fan Tutte’ targets millennials

From left: Carlo Mañalac, Carlo Falcis and Roby Malubay

The title of this Italian opera by Mozart means “all women are the same.” Its plot concerns two friends betting about their respective fiancee’s loyalty. When a third friend warns them not to be too trusting for all "women are the same," they test their sweethearts’ loyalties by disguising themselves and wooing their lovers to see who remains true.

The Manila Chamber Orchestra Foundation (MCOF) production on Nov. 28 at 7 p.m. at Ayala Museum stars members of the Viva Voce Ensemble: soprano Anna Migallos as Fiordiligi, soprano Aissa Guilatco as Dorabella, tenor Carlo Mañalac as Ferrando, baritone Carlo Falcis as Guglielmo, mezzo soprano Roxy Aldiosa as Despina and bass baritone Roby Mahusay as Don Alfonso.

The male cast shared that the opera’s setting will have a contemporary feel. Falcis said, “It will be different in a sense that it is more ‘now’. Our characters are living in the present. They’re like yuppies living in the age of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. The characters are more adult, not teens. Their relationship problems are real as they are today. But we remain faithful to Mozart’s music, the Italian text and how the story goes.”

Malubay agreed, “This ‘Cosi’ is different because it is in a modern setting. We think millennials can relate to it, especially those with complicated love lives.”

Directed by and under the musical supervision of Camille Lopez Molina, “Cosi fan Tutte” also features recitative parts which Mañalac, 28, a voice graduate of St. Scholastica’s College (SSC), finds challenging. These are what he called “the conversations in the opera. All the while I thought it was easy. A recitative has its own style. It’s another discipline.”

He described his role of Ferrando as a “hyper and energetic guy but a control freak” who finds it hard to let go. He added, “The opera is basically about letting go and having fun. The high tessitura of my role needs a lot of stamina. I don’t know why Mozart does this to his tenors and sopranos! Anyway, I’m working really hard to have that stamina.”

Also an SSC graduate, major in voice, and the oldest among the guys at 35, Falcis said the part of Guglielmo “has been the role I've been doing ever since. But we always have different takes on it. Aside from relearning the songs and adding the recitatives, this Guglielmo is different from the ones I’ve played. He’s more serious and mature, not as playful as before. So I had to pull back a bit from that playful side and become a more adult.”

He continued, “What makes ‘Cosi’ special is the ensemble work—how Mozart married the words with the music and with the characters themselves, how he let lines flow from one character to another with his whole music. I have learned so much on how to be a team player in an ensemble because of ‘Cosi.’”

Malubay, 25, an SSC student taking his second degree in voice, has to strike a balance between his studies and performing professionally. He said, “Studying the opera is a challenge because i did some parts of it before, but now we will add recitatives. Mozart’s work sounds easy, but if you work and perform it, it has big, big obstacles for a singer when it comes to technique and endurance.”

He plays Don Alfonso in his favorite opera. To prepare he has watched different versions of the opera so that he has an idea what the story is about, who Don Alfonso is in the story.

Food and water play a huge part in their pre- and post-performance. Manalac always treats himself to warm soup before going onstage, adding, “I always like performing with a full stomach. I find it easier for me to sing when I’m full. And after performances, anything goes. Usually the group goes out for good food again. We talk about the funny things that happened during the performance.”

Falcis likes some quiet time before the performance “to get my mind and whole being focused on the work at hand and calm down my nerves. Afterwards, we can chill. Chilling takes a lot of forms: eating out, having coffee or ice cream.”

Malubay prefers to just drink water to hydrate his body and vocal folds, practice his lines and keep his mind full of happy and positive vibes. He also exercises.

For tickets, call Ticketworld at tel. no. 891-9999, MCOF, 997-9483, 782-7184 or cell phone nos. 0920-9540053 and 0918-347-3027. --Elizabeth Lolarga

The cast of Cosi fan Tutte


This article was first published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer's Lifestyle section on Nov. 21, 2016.

Camille Lopez Molina and her love of music and singing

Camille Lopez Molina

The word “chiaroscuro” may be inextricable from the world of painting. This hasn’t stopped soprano Camille Lopez Molina and pianist Najib Ismail from choosing it to be part of their coming concert’s title, “Love in Chiaroscuro,” on Sept. 15 at 7 p.m. at the Ayala Museum in Makati.

While they brainstormed about the repertoire, they started choosing songs based on what they felt strongly about. Molina said, “You want your audience to enjoy your performance. But they only receive and reciprocate the performers’ own enjoyment. The terms ‘nuance,’ ‘expression,’ ‘colors,’ ‘shades,’ ‘levels,’ ‘layers,’ ‘contrasts’ can refer to the voice, text, music and personal references. Chiaroscuro, referring to the play of light and shade in painting, drawing, photography and other visual arts, seemed to be the word that articulated most clearly what we meant.”

Among her personal preferences in the program are: Liszt’s “Sonata de Petraca,” Wagner’s portrayal of love in “Wessendonk Song,” “Song to the Moon” from Dvorak's “Rusalka” which, by the way, she voiced in the Peque Gallaga film “Sonata” wherein Cherie Gil played a diva who had seen better days.

Although Molina sings with the vocal ensemble Viva Voce of which she is founder-artistic director, she seldom holds solo concerts. “Love in Chiaroscuro” is the first since 2010. After her students Myramae Meneses, Renee Michaela Fajardo and Anna Dinah Migallos were featured in the concert “Divas: The Beauty of the Soprano Voice” in April this year, Joseph Uy of the Cultural Arts Events Organizer and Manila Chamber Orchestra Foundation (MCOF) asked this writer to go up to Molina to the holding room and tell her she was being lined up next on the second half of this year.

She recalled with a laugh, “The decision was clinched for me. I was given a date and told to have a recital. ’Yun na ’yon (That was that)!” As two of the country’s top voice teachers, she and her husband Pablo are overjoyed at the triumphant acceptance of Fajardo and Meneses at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London and recently, Migallos’s being the star of the night at an Indonesia Opera Society event in Jakarta.

She said on the effectiveness of her team teaching with Pablo: “His is the technical brain. I’m more on the application and interpretation. There is a sense of validation which is fulfilling (when our students make it abroad). After the initial thrill, it always boils down to what are we doing next? What else can be improved? There’s always something to improve, if not vocally, then maybe physically, or as is usually the case, mentally. Singing is coordination, a synthesis of physicality, emotions, artistry, intellect, energy, etc. Since we are constantly evolving as human beings, then the process of learning is never-ending.”

Ismail assured that Thursday’s concert would have hugot songs, meaning, the song’s interpretation comes from somewhere deep. Molina said, “Najib and I are similar in how we go into the music so our repertoire is a true collaboration. We bounce opinions back and forth. He knows my voice and what I can do. I know him and what he loves to play. So yes, these songs are straight from our hearts and guts.”

Asked to comment on the film “Florence Foster Jenkins” and its tone-deaf protagonist, she said, “I loved it. It expressed so much of what lovers of music feel, of what all musicians and artists feel about their craft. It wasn’t about Florence’s lack of talent, but how much she loved singing because she loved the music.”

For tickets, call Ticketworld at 891-9999 or the MCOF, tel. nos. 997-9483, 782-7164 or cell phone nos. 0920-9540053 and 0918-347-3027.

Published in the online edition of Philippine Daily Inquirer, Sept. 14, 2016

Pianist: ‘Lieder shows Espiritu’s wonderful art’

Arthur Espiritu and Najib Ismail

Pianist: ‘Lieder shows Espiritu’s wonderful art’

Three sopranos who’re lovely in and out

The three women are the featured artists in the concert “Divas: The Beauty of the Soprano Voice” on April 9 at 7:30 p.m., at Ayala Museum in Makati City.
They go by the old definition of “diva,” which Wikipedia states as “a celebrated female singer; a woman of outstanding talent in the world of opera and by extension, in theater, cinema and popular music.”

Read more: http://lifestyle.inquirer.net/226068/three-sopranos-whore-lovely-in-and-out#ixzz44tcZWhHm
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Anna Migallos

Renee Michaela Fajardo

Myramae Tapia Meneses

Tribute to Mario Lanza: Tenor Nival’s moment in time

Nomher Nival on Mario Lanza:

“I love his voice. We took him up in school. I heard him for the first time around my second or third year at the University of Santo Tomas Conservatory of Music. I love his ‘Because’ because he sang it passionately. He was so romantic and full of energy. He was one of those singers who sang full blast. Contrary to people’s impression that he was shouting, he was actually very intense.”

Read more: Tribute to Mario Lanza: Tenor Nival’s moment in time

Tenor Arthur Espiritu shares lessons on taking care of one’s voice | Vera Files

Tenor Arthur Espiritu shares lessons on taking care of one’s voice   | Vera Files

He makes all things new

Of all the public art I managed to see last year, it's Leeroy New's installation of a multi-color fly at the fountain of the Ayala Museum that struck me as most interesting, most inexpensive and most environmentally friendly. Look closely and find out why. May we see more such works this year. Leeroy's the boy for that. We're heavily counting on him and his wild mind.

Photos by Babeth Lolarga

The elegant pianist returns home—with her memoir

The elegant pianist returns home—with her memoir

MSO's masterstroke

The MSO under Prof. Arturo Molina about to take a bow at last week's "Opera Vs. Broadway" at Ayala Museum.

The Manila Symphony Orchestra's masterstroke this year in attracting an ever-increasing number of followers in Metro Manila is pitting popular music fare with the classical. In its nine rush-hour concerts this year alone, we've seen them do "Bach Vs. Beatles," a concert that the MSO later brought to Baguio City along with "Soundtracks and Symphonies" as part of its Music Everywhere outreach program.

Even with a serious program like July's "Transfigured Night" (music by Schoenberg), the program never failed to engage. Always there is an educational component--a conductor or MSO official faces the audience to give the context of the music. After all, to continue to exist in this generation of millennials, the MSO has to use the media the kids are used to for social marketing (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Mailchimp) and for staging (attractive PowerPoint presentations projected in the background).

Each concert is entertainingly annotated by Jeffrey Solares, the orchestra's executive director, who knows his audience's kaliti by making references to popular figures or ideas in a manner and a language that are also pop. He banishes all notions that classical music is only for the elite and the erudite. He encourages more people to attend live performances instead of settling for YouTube or recordings because of the elements of excitement and unpredictability, saying, "Lots of things can happen--a voice can croak, strings can break..."

He defines opera as a musical art form that emulates Greek theater and formed by poets, philosophers and musicians who had studied Greek drama. To open last week's program of "Marriage of Figaro," the MSO played Mozart's "Overture to Marriage of Figaro," an opera that Solares describes as controversial during its time in the last 1700s because it dared to poke fun at the dukes, duchesses and other members of the royalty and it was from the point of view of the servants.

Michaela Fajardo, soprano with a creamy voice

What made the concert doubly special was the participation of some members of the country's premier vocal ensemble, Viva Voce. Soprano Michaela Fajardo surprised us immediately with the aria "Voi Che Sapete" or "Tell Me What Love Is." It's a textured voice--high and deep, if that were possible. Plus it had volume that could extend up to the back row of the capacity crowd. Impresario Joseph Uy, if he had been there, would've described the voice's quality as "creamy" to mean a pure lyric voice.

Carlo Mañalac may look skinny and fragile for a tenor but his voice has power.

Solares disclosed that Fajardo was his violin student for four years. When she wasn't turning up for lessons anymore, he was happily surprised to learn that she had shifted to voice as her major. Young, fresh-faced tenor Carlo Mañalac showed a nervous quiver in his voice in the initial notes and lyrics of Donizetti's romanza, "Una Furtiva Lagrima" from the opera L'elesir di amore. Solares noted how operas are all bound by one theme: love or doomed love.

Our favorite aria was sung: Musetta's aria "Quando Me En Vo" from Puccini's La Boheme with soprano Iona Ventocilla proving that she can alternate the roles of the suffering seamstress Mimi and the coquettish Musetta. (By the way, the chamber version of La Boheme will be restaged by Viva Voce on Nov. 26 at Ayala Museum after the acclaimed summer presentation of the well-loved opera at Baguio's Hill Station. Last Tuesday's museum audience had a glimpse of the dramatic dynamics and singing of Ventoncilla as Mimi and Mañalac as Rodolfo in their duet "O Soave Fanciula.")

The rush-hour concerts, meant to draw Makati's young professionals so they can skip the after-5 p.m. traffic, are short enough not to require an intermission, but the MSO instead played the sweetly melodious intermezzo from "Cavalleria Rusticana" that had the audience heave a collective sigh at the end. For this alone our evening was made.

There was, of course, the accession to popular fare: overtures from My Fair Lady and Westside Story, songs from Phantom of the Opera, Jekyll and Hyde where tenor Carlo Falcis proved he could be a belter in reality TV shows cum singing competitions, Rent and Les Miserables. For an encore, the MSO obliged with the overture from Chicago.

I confess to being biased. When the classics face off with pop, the classics win by a knockout.

Transfigured by music

I'm writing this on the last day of July, the feast day of St. Ignatius of Loyola for whom this prayer was composed:

Lord, teach me to be generous.
Teach me to serve You as You deserve;
to give and not to count the cost,
to fight and not to heed the wounds,
to toil and not to seek for rest,
to labor and not to ask for reward,
save that of knowing that I do Your will.

St. Ignatius of Loyola,
pray for us.

Front, back and front of the Maestro with some MSO members Photos by Kimi L. Fernandez

You can say today's blog is an offering to the ones who keep the music alive. They help us rest from our labors so we can be energized again to do the Lord's will.

If you grew up on what to others is the "fairy tale" of the Blessed Mother, St. Joseph the Worker and Jesus Christ, the poem "Verklärte Nacht" or "Transfigured Night" by German writer Richard Dehmel makes you think of the Holy Family in a big and bigger way. I don't claim knowledge of the context in which the poet wrote it.

Thano Adamopoulos, the visiting Belgian-Greek conductor who led the Manila Symphony Orchestra, particularly its string section in Arnold Schoenberg's "Verklarte Nacht," first turned around to explain to the audience the sounds we were expected to hear to express the emotions going through the protagonists in the poem.

This is a case where a poem inspired the music. My eldest child Kimi, who's into contemporary and pop music, accompanied me to this concert. She was overwhelmed (okay, impressed) by Schoenberg's music despite its initially alien sound. She said of Maestro Adamopoulos's handling of the MSO--"hindi siya pa-sundot-sundot lang". What she meant was that after we heard a mini lecture followed by the performance, by George, we got it! The music wasn't that strange anymore. It was profoundly moving and yes, as the maestro said, cinematic or almost like a film score.

And it was to me the story of Joseph, Mary and the Son of Man in her womb. The two persons in "Transfigured Night" weren't plain sweethearts. I could imagine the expression on Joseph's face as Mary revealed she was with child, and it wasn't his. He is stunned before he accepts and tells her he will raise and embrace the baby as his own. Makes the few remaining hair on my arms go up.

Transfigured Night

Two people walk through a bare, cold grove;
The moon races along with them, they look into it.
The moon races over tall oaks,
No cloud obscures the light from the sky,
Into which the black points of the boughs reach.
A woman’s voice speaks:

I’m carrying a child, and not yours,
I walk in sin beside you.
I have committed a great offense against myself.
I no longer believed I could be happy
And yet I had a strong yearning
For something to fill my life, for the joys of
Motherhood
And for duty; so I committed an effrontery,
So, shuddering, I allowed my sex
To be embraced by a strange man,
And, on top of that, I blessed myself for it.
Now life has taken its revenge:
Now I have met you, oh, you.

She walks with a clumsy gait,
She looks up; the moon is racing along.
Her dark gaze is drowned in light.
A man’s voice speaks:

May the child you conceived
Be no burden to your soul;
Just see how brightly the universe is gleaming!
There’s a glow around everything;
You are floating with me on a cold ocean,
But a special warmth flickers
From you into me, from me into you.
It will transfigure the strange man’s child.
You will bear the child for me, as if it were mine;
You have brought the glow into me,
You have made me like a child myself.

He grasps her around her ample hips.
Their breath kisses in the breeze.
Two people walk through the lofty, bright night.

Saraza both at work and at play

The second part of the concert "Heart, Strings" featured violinist Diomedes Saraza Jr. as soloist in Bizet's "Carmen," Louie Ocampo's "Kahit Isang Saglit" and Willy Cruz's "Sana'y Wala Nang Wakas." MSO Executive Director Jeffrey Solares revealed that the former prodigy was just "Babes" to the MSO when he was a kid. Radio man Bert Robledo calls him "Junjun."

By whatever name he's called the whiz kid from Juilliard School of Music treated the audience to kilig to the bones music meant for drama-ramas or teleserye. Ayos ang gabi! What a good night the 15th of July was.

Souvenir with Maestro and my friend Joseph Uy who's my private music tutor

The oddly named soprano

Girly and girlish despite her manly first and second names of Micah and David, plus a masculine nickname of Mico, with a sharp guttural end-stop on the last vowel "o", soprano Micah David Galang is this year's first featured artist in the Manila Chamber Orchestra Foundation's Young Artists Series. She sings a program of Mozart, Delibes, Donizetti, Francisco Feliciano, Lucio San Pedro and Agot Espina. Expect to be knocked off your seats when you hear the voice that DZFE's Bert Robledo described as reaching "the stratosphere's high notes." Photos by Babeth Lolarga

With her assisting artist Farley Asuncion (and on performance night, guitarist Angelica Vinculada), Mico will do the Philippine premiere of Feliciano's “Boulevard dela Rosa Rojas” for voice, piano and guitar. It was originally written for Mico's teacher Naomi Sison. Another Filipino treasure of a song to watch out for because it's rarely heard, if at all, is Espina's "Kundiman ng Lahi." This is already making tomorrow at 7 p.m. at the Ayala Museum lobby a night to remember.

Her parents, whose romance blossomed at a choir, named Mico after male prophets in their desire for her to become a strong woman. Here she is with Farley, Joseph Uy and Angel Reyes Nacino of the MCO Foundation. Before a performance, she has her "quiet time" no different from her daily devotion either upon waking or before going to sleep." Asked why this devotion is important, she said, "I like to meditate on a biblical verse and write in my journal. I hold on to my faith and personal relation with Jesus. That is where everything should be centered."

Standing at five feet and one inch, Mico has an outdoorsy side that allows her time from her rehearsals to backpack with friends for surfing lessons at the Zambales Crystal Beach Resort where "the waves are nice. I wasn't the sporty type until I tried it. I loved it! I also like to sit on the beach, and just stare at the horizon or watch the sunset. And ponder. Faith is at the core to my being a singer."

The MCOF Young Artists Series is long-standing program of the MCO Foundation that provides performance opportunities for young, budding artists to give them the exposure, experience and endorsement and help them show their talents to the public, and carve a name in the classical music field. Many of the artists that the MCOF has featured have won music scholarships and competitions and are doing well in their careers.

For tickets, call the MCOF at 997-9483 or 0920-954-0053, CAEO at 782-7164 or 0918-347-3027 and at Ticketworld 891-9999.

Adventures with Sister Suzy

Our Merry Maller at the Capitol Commons Estancia something or other

Ellen Suzanne Lolarga is my number two sister (before her is Evelyn Marie or Embeng and after her are Genevieve Therese, Pinky for short, and Eugenia Celerina, just Gigi to all). I was five years old when Suzy was born.

I still remember seeing my mother going into labor. My Dad, yaya and I accompanied Mom to the University of the East-Ramon Magsaysay Medical Center. When Mom was wheeled into the delivery room on a gurney, she waved to Dad with instructions for the yaya to walk me home. That was my first memory of Su, as she was about to enter our lives.

My second memory of her was at Luneta Park in the early '60s (not Doroy Valencia's Rizal Park yet). We were near the breakwaters: Mom, the yaya, Suzy and me. I had the urge to pee. There were no portalets then. So Mom brought me to peepee by a bush, but I got bitten by ants on my buttocks, and I squealed like the piglet I can be sometimes. So Mom and yaya had to brush off the ants. Meanwhile, Suzy, a toddler by then, wandered away. When the adults realized she was amiss, it was Press the Panic Button time.

That must have been a weekend; there were just too many people (already!) then. Meanwhile, I remember being held by my hand tightly so I couldn't go astray either as Mom and yaya searched high and low for Suzy by which time, Mom being Mom, was in near hysterics. From the park we walked all the way to The Manila Hotel. It was already dark. As we approached the hotel, a car's headlights were switched on--and there was Suzy in the light, still dressed up like a doll with her bonnet and little handbag.

Whenever this story is recalled in family conversations, Gigi never fails to say that it was a sign of things to come. That is, Suzy would turn into a Merry Maller. On certain after-school days or weekends, that's what she does for exercise. Now and then she picks up a knickknack or three, most especially children's books from Book Sale that she can use for her Montessori class or to give to her grandnieces Max and Kai and grandnephew Jared.

The rest of the abubots are stashed in her aparador. Whenever there's a birthday, a wedding or similar festive occasions, she always has something ready. When we have no time to shop, we go to her and request for a suitable item when a friend or family member is having a thing (birthday or anniversary). Of course, we pay up.

Kind, gentle to all the wee ones in our lives, Suzy is shown here wiping traces of ube ice cream from Jared Susi's mouth.

This makes Suzy the perfect steward of our household budget now that Mom is retired from that. She settles the electric, phone, Wifi and water bills, does the groceries (the others contribute, too).

Every family needs a Suzy who is quiet, dependable, loves little children and lets them go to her for comfort and loving loving. And she is that silent patron of art and music, a cultural soldier, daresay I. She's gonna pinch me tonight (she's my roommate when I'm at Mom's).

Happy birth month, sis!

Suzy with tenor Arthur Espiritu, the prince of cantabile, a title given him by music reviewer Pablo Tariman, at Ayala Museum in 2013. This was at a post-Yolanda fundraising concert called "Arthur Espiritu and Friends." The other singers were sopranos Myramae Meneses and Kay Balajadia-Liggayu and tenor Nomher Nival.

Tenor Nomher Nival in a relaxed moment after "Donizetti and Friends," the last of two Opera Gala series featuring the participants in the first intensive vocal workshop/master class in the Philippines of soprano great Nelly Miricioiu Photos by Babeth Lolarga

Last Saturday (March 21), her birthday, she spent the evening with me at the Ayala Museum. Tenor Nomher Nival dedicated the penultimate number in the Opera Gala recital called Donizetti and Friends "to Suzy."

Following is the English translation of the aria, Donizetti's "Una Furtiva Lagrima," from the Italian comic opera L'Elisir d'Amore (The Elixir of Love):

A single secret tear
from her eye did spring:
as if she envied all the youths
that laughingly passed her by.
What more searching need I do?
What more searching need I do?
She loves me! Yes, she loves me, I see it. I see it.
For just an instant the beating
of her beautiful heart I could feel!
As if my sighs were hers,
and her sighs were mine!
The beating, the beating of her heart I could feel,
to merge my sighs with hers...
Heavens! Yes, I could die!
I could ask for nothing more, nothing more.
Oh, heavens! Yes, I could, I could die!
I could ask for nothing more, nothing more.
Yes, I could die! Yes, I could die of love.

Thank you, Joseph Uy and Nomher, for making Suzy happy.

Master class with Maestra Nelly | Vera Files

Master class with Maestra Nelly | Vera Files

The kind of old woman I want to be

Two loveable fatties who double as candlesticks found in Gilda's boudoir, a gift from her daughter-in-law Lanelle Abueva Fernando

In a matter of six months, I shall be turning sixty and zero, the age that'll entitle me to wave a senior citizen card at the pharmacist, bus conductor, waiter, supermarket checkout counter girl and best of all, at museum admission counters.

More than those privileges, I am more concerned with the kind of "hip crone" I want to be. I count myself lucky because I have living models who, as one of them puts it lightly, "love art and walkers."

I've shared meals with them, helped them out of cars, pushed their walkers that, when turned around, convert to seats when they tire. Gilda calls hers a kariton. Sylvia knows the long technical term (sorry, I can't recall, evidence that my memory is becoming unreliable).

Gilda and Sylvia viewing "Mexico: Fantastic Identity, 20th Century Masterpieces, FEMSA Collection"

What I've grown to like is being invited to their gallery hops. One took us to that heavily guarded rare exhibition of Mexican art (Rivera, Orozco, Tamayo, Kahlo) at the Ayala Museum. Picture-taking was strictly prohibited, but I managed to sneak a shot of the women on their walkers intently looking at and discussing an artwork.

We made a special trip to Crucible Gallery a few hours before Manuel Ocampo's solo show opened, mainly out of curiosity over what million-peso paintings look like and why collectors are falling over one another to acquire them. Gilda turned to Sylvia to say, straight-faced, "O, Ibyang, eto gusto ko. Bili mo para sakin."

Serious about their art appreciation. Or maybe their thought bubbles read, "But I can paint better!"

Art, humor, walker, but with my heft, my mobile seat may look something like this. And I'll need a retired but still well-buffed male dance instructor to push me around.

So I say to Father Time as I move towards my bonus years, "Bring it on!"

Armchairs with rollers at Gilda's living room Photos by Babeth Lolarga

O light, o music divine

Looking pleased even from her side view, lyric coloratura Sumi Jo, a superstar in the operatic and cross-over music world, enfolds soprano Myramae Meneses in her loving arms during a master class at St. Scholastica's College in February this year. Photo by Anna Leah Sarabia

Ms Meneses (in white) and tenor Ivan Niccolo Nery (rightmost) at the Viva Voce's repeat of "Complicated The Concert" at the Lopez Museum in July Photo by Babeth Lolarga

The days are shortening, the nights are lengthening, and we just hurried past mid-November! I once wrote a former pen pal (Frank Cimatu, then on Friendly fellowship in Seattle) how my young children then wished that November could be skipped so that their eager hands and hearts could get on with the "business" of Christmas (unwrapping presents, receiving gold and red ampao envelopes and such).

Often and nearly forgotten during the lead-up to Yuletide are people for whom the merriment of the season feels like a stinging slap on the face, that is, they may resent it in their pain or lonesomeness. Is it any wonder that cases of depression are ironically high during this celebratory season?

And here comes the Culture Arts Events Organizer (CAEO) about to swing a balance between the celebration of the liberator Christ child's birth and putting The Beatitudes into action. Its concert, "Christmas Solstice," billed as an evening of timeless Christmas carols on Dec. 7 at 7:30 p.m. at the Ayala Museum on Makati Ave. will have for its beneficiaries children who need medical treatment for their cancer.

The three featured singers are among the most sought after following their respective professional debuts at the same venue in 2013 and this year: soprano Myramae Meneses and Stephanie Aguilar, and tenor Ivan Niccolo Nery. Pianist Greg Zuniega will assist them in their renditions of carols from the 17th century to the present. These songs include: Felipe de leon's "Pasko Na, Sinta Ko" and "Payapang Daigdig", the exquisite "Cantique de Noel" (also known as "O Holy Night"), Andrew Lloyd Webber's masterpiece "Pie Jesu," Cesar Franck's "Panis Angelicus," Handel's "Let the Bright Seraphim."

The Handel aria, which is from his opera Samson, has been interpreted, each in their lovely way, by sopranos Renee Fleming, Kiri Te Kanawa and Kathleen Battle (go to YouTube, my friend!). A bit of background on the lyrics is: "the aria summons the celestial hosts of seraphim and cherubim to hail the dead hero, with trumpet figures responding to the singer." (Source: http://www.laphil.com/philpedia/music/let-bright-seraphim-george-frideric-handel)

Let us go then, let us go with the angels as one imagines them descending as these are sung on Advent's first Sunday:

Let the bright seraphim
in burning row,
their loud, uplifted angel trumpets blow.

Let the cherubic host,
in tuneful choirs,
touch their immortal harps
with golden wires.

Tickets are available at Ticketworld, tel. no. 891-9999, or the CAEO, tel. nos. 782-7164, 517-3763, 0920-954-0053, 0918-347-3027 or 0920-465-5725.

Gabby, the piano guy

Pianist Gabriel Allan Paguirigan (left) looks like he's considering whether or not to belt out "The Sound of Music" somewhere in Austria where he performed at the Liesing chamber music festival earlier this year. He is the featured soloist in the Manila Chamber Orchestra Foundation Young Artists Series concert on Sept. 17 at 7 p.m. at the Ayala Museum. Photos of Liesing, Austria, courtesy of Gabby

With chamber musicians at the Liesing music fest. The program included Dvorak's Piano Quintet No. 2 in A Major, First Movement and Bartok's Contrasts for Piano, Violin and Clarinet. Dr. Victor Asuncion, in whose master class Gabby had studied, recommended him for that all-expenses paid trip to Europe. Gabby says of his first overseas experience as performer: "I was exposed to higher standards, and I saw how classical music is deeply a part of their lives and culture there. The audience saw that someone from the Philippines could be part of a festival like that. I hope I've helped pave the way for our other musicians to be invited."

"To play a wrong note is insignificant; to play without passion is inexcusable." - Beethoven

One can truly learn from Gabby's relaxed attitude towards committing mistakes during either a rehearsal or a performance. He says, "My approach is to just move on. Don't get stuck in it. Yung pagkakamali, palatandaan na tao ka pa rin."

He is on his fifth year as a piano major at the University of the Philippines College of Music with just a few general education units to finish so he can graduate next year.

He may be called an accidental pianist. At age four or five, he liked to tinker with a battery-operated toy piano while his grandmother watched over him. His mother was out working as a nurse and his father was employed in a private firm. Lola Ester noticed that he could seek out with his fingers the melodies of a pop song like "Love Is All that Matters" or "Do Re Mi" from The Sound of Music.

One time he told his folks that he wanted to take piano lessons. They discouraged him, saying, "Baka paluin ng teacher ang kamay mo pag nagkamali ka." Like any concerned parent, his mother's dream for him was to become a nurse or to join an allied medical profession to assure him of a stable future.

His elders acceded to his wish when the family moved from Makati to Pasig where they found him a piano teacher, Hannah Valdez-Sariego. She would submit his name for piano competitions. Gabby recalls, "I wasn't serious yet with my playing--bara-bara lang kung tumugtog."

On Bach: "I can listen to him continuously for a week, he and no other composer. Masarap, nakaka-high!" When he was studying Bach's Chaconne with legendary piano teacher Nita Abrogar-Quinto, he told her, "Ma'am, ang ganda kahit anong piyesa ni Bach." She told him, "Basta si Bach, maganda. Akala mo yon na yon, tapos meron pang mangyayari alongside it." Photos by Babeth Lolarga

By the time he was at the Philippine High School for the Arts in Makiling, Laguna, he was playing "because I liked it, but I still couldn't see if I could live on it, if it would be my life. Eventually, I became serious about it because of the competitive spirit among the music majors there. When I joined and started winning competitions, I realized okey, kaya ko pala. Parte na ito ng buhay ko."

His parents came around to seeing that their Gabby could really make it as a professional musician when he performed as a soloist during the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra's season finale last year. He saw his dream taking off and unfolding when he became part of a concert season, his name prominent on the posters and tarps of the Cultural Center. They told him, "Kung saan ka masaya." More than that, Gabby says, they've realized that he has something important to contribute to the Philippine music scene.

From the most recent masterclass he attended under Cecile Licad, he and the other young pianists were encouraged to experiment more in their playing. She told them that it wasn't just a matter of mastery of notes; interpretation was just or more important.

He remembers Ms. Abrogar-Quinto stressing the same thing. The late teacher once advised him that when he's joining competitions wherein he has to play the same piece as the others, he must come across as "super convincing as if I owned the piece."- Elizabeth Lolarga

For his Sept. 17 performance, Gabby's program includes: Bach-Petri's "Sheep May Safely Graze from Hut"; Haydn's Sonata in D major, Hob 16:24; Brahms' Vier Klavierstucke Op 119; Chopin's Berceuse in D-flat Major; Custodio's Pauli-uli ; and Liszt's Piano Sonata in b minor.

The girl with the pink French horn

Danielle Kuhlmann of Cultures in Harmony USA is one of four musicians who integrated with the Tagbanua community in Culion island, Northern Palawan. Culion is one of those affected by Super-typhoon Yolanda, but it remains largely out of the public eye in terms of relief and rehabilitation work because of the attention focused on Leyte. The musicians brought not the usual kind of relief goods. They had a learning exchange workshop to enable the Tagbanuans "to find strength in the richness of their own traditional music and culture" and for the Americans to see the similarities of indigenous and the classical and how they could co-exist.

That's Frank Shaw (left), who played the viola, and Danielle talking about their immersion experience and also about the music they're about to play to the audience at the Manila Symphony Orchestra's Rush Hour Concert No. 6, billed as "a different kind of traffic jam." There was no traffic on Aug. 21, a holiday, on the roads leading to Ayala Museum. One of the most touching Filipino pieces that the Americans played was the Bikolano folk song "Si Nanay, si Tatay Di Co Babayaan," arranged by Maestro Jeffrey Solares. Although it was only the music that Shaw and cellist Kim Patterson performed, it still carried that sense of gratitude for the mother on whose breast a child once suckled; as an adult he/she realizes that what the mother gave can never be repaid.

It's always a joy to watch the MSO Junior Orchestra players perform under Solares. After they're seated, they have an ate-kuya (older sis-older bro) system in place. Apart from sharing the music sheets, the bigger or more experienced kids sit alongside the younger ones to guide them and ensure that their instruments are in place.

Yes, they are truly kids and act like kids but only after performing like pros. How many times did we hear someone from the audience (and I'm 98 percent sure it ain't a relative of a young musician) exclaim, "Ang galing naman!" after the last note was played, including the penultimate "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" by child wiz Mozart. Jenny Juan, grandmother of one of the teenage violinists, is optimistic about what's ahead of these kids: "Give them some more years, then we'll have our own orchestra that's on par with the New York or Berlin Philharmonic!" Let's continue to hope so, Jenny, and be around during their energetic performances whenever we can.

Look for the female French horn player with the instrument's mouth painted a pretty pink--she faithfully transcribed "Paalam," a Tagbanua folk song, for the Cultures in Harmony USA, the MSO Strings and the MSO Junior Orchestra to play after a video of the community members singing and playing the tune using makeshift jew's harp and percussive instruments from tin cans was shown. The audience rose as one, cheering and thanking the musicians who premiered the work that now can be played by any orchestra.

Danielle poses with my niece Bianca L. Susi, the family's own private pianist.

Jenny Juan with Danielle who's holding a copy of friend Geraldine C. Maayo's collection of short fiction that I told her she could read on the plane back to the US. Cultures in Harmony USA left the country Aug. 22, but what they had given and received is beyond measure. Photos by Babeth Lolarga