22 posts tagged “culture”

Hey everyone, INVITE me to your posse.....! i'm up for friends.. thanks. ^_^

I'm on Level 51.

What a plug. hehe.

This is my first piano piece. I learned this when I was about 11 and I'm proud to say that I really practiced hard at home and learned mostly by myself.

Here's a famous pianist, Ivo Pogorelich in one of his performances.. I feel, though, that the music is recorded.

I'll finally see one of my favorite operas on stage, Giacomo Puccini's Turandot.

2009 seems to be a very cool year for my theatre list. I've been dreeeaming to at least see this, but it's so thrilling to learn that I wished, and it's coming true!

Here's their Press Release:

Korean production of Turandot at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP)

The Seoul Romance Philharmonic Orchestra, in collaboration with the Cultural Center of the Philippines, presents Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot, a full-length opera, on June 18-20, 2009 at the CCP Main Theater. This event is held in celebration of the 60th anniversary of the diplomatic relations between the Philippines and Korea.

Featuring top Filipino and Korean opera singers and the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra, the production is set in Peking during “legendary” times. The evil Princess Turandot announces that she will marry the first man to answer her three riddles, and unsuccessful candidates will be decapitated.

Timur, the deposed King of Tartary, recognizes his son, Calaf, in a crowd assembled to witness one of these executions. Timur is with the slave girl Liu, who loves Calaf. However, Calaf loves Turandot and he resolves to solve her riddles. Turandot ridicules Calaf’s quest for her hand, and is less than happy when he answers her questions correctly. In an uncommonly generous move Calaf tells Turandot that if she can guess his name before the following dawn, she may have him killed. Turandot promptly orders mass executions if his name is not brought to her, so the people turn against him. They capture Liu and Timus, and Liu kills herself rather than give up the name of the man she loves. Calaf then professes his love for Turandot and melts her icy heart.  

Composed sometime in 1920-1926, Puccini spent the last five years of his life working on Turandot. He patched up his differences with Giuseppe Adami who, together with Renato Simoni, got to work on creating a libretto from Carlo Gozzi’s fairytale. After Puccini died, the task of completing Turandot fell on Franco Alfano, whose version is most often heard today. The opera premiered in La Scala, Milan in 1926.

‘Nessun Dorma’ (No One Sleeps), the aria from Puccini’s final opera Turandot became arguably the most popular operatic aria in the world in 1990 when it was sung by Italian tenor Luciano Pavarotti on the eve of the football World Cup Final in Rome. This was the first Three Tenors concert (also starring Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras) and the tune remains hugely popular.

I watched Ateneo Blue Repertory's Bare the Musical last Saturday evening with Mik33 and G3L0 at the Ateneo Gonzaga Exhibit Hall / Theatre.

We met around 5pm and had snacks and dinner along Katipunan Avenue.I was excited for I'd been looking forward to see this on stage, and finally we'll see it.

When we got in the theatre, we were a little disappointed as the theatre was not air-conditioned.

From the parking area, we saw the windows were opened but we thought that those would be closed during the play proper, we even armed ourselves with sweaters as we didn't want to feel cold and lose our focus.. Unfortunately, the air-conditioning weren't opened. I wonder why.

We got the front seats, they were real pews and we're seated beside the actors whom I didn't notice at first that they're acting already for 10 minutes.

Anyway, the play was absolutely beautiful.. I'm impressed, and I'm really happy about it.

I mentioned weeks ago that I'm expecting much from the Ateneo BlueRep, and yes, they have exceeded my expectation.

My comments..

Bibo Reyes is a promising actor. When we first got a glimpse of him through Bare Manila's Multiply page, we didn't expect a chubby guy.. nevertheless, he's cute.

His acting was perfect, his voice was so nice. In exaggeration, I would think that I'm listening to the recorded version. We agree that he dominated during the play, as he gave life to Peter Simonds with real oomph.

Anyway, I heard about Amos Francia a few years back, but that's a different story.

With regard to his acting.. he's got great vocals, he can sing.. and I'm really happy to hear him.. his acting was great too, however, there were moments where he's overdone, there were inconsistencies with his character portrayal as Jason McConnell, but then, he's a really great actor.

I want to see him perform again on his next projects, but this time, I want to see the flexibility of his skills, and not just drama, I guess.

Now, for Delphine Buencamino, she's good.. but her singing had few flaws, she was singing sharp and with her acting, she seemed too reserved and her portrayal of Ivy Robinson seemed a little conservative, yet she's known as the school bitch.. (bitch! bitch! and as Nadia would say beeeetch! ^_^).. but she's pretty and I liked her.

Cassie Manalastas as Nadia McConnell.. is one of my favorites, alongside Bibo. She has a really lovely voice, I could feel her singing, and her acting was impressive. I love her.

For Sister Chantelle..!! I love the character, but we got the impression that Kahelle Sanchez would play her, we never thought that there were 2 actors.. Rem Zamora was really funny, he made the character really good and showed who Sister Chantelle really is in the play.

Ok, for Matt LLoyd.. we all loved Bym Buhain, we all agreed that he could play Jason, the straight-acting coward better than Amos Francia, but he's great.

** **

I was doing sing-along most of the time, aha! There were scenes where I cannot help but show how touched I was with their acting and the story. ^_^

I recommend everyone to see this.

After the play, we drove off to Eastwood Libis to have late evening meals, and I was feeling good.. I got the hang of it, and I keep on thinking Jason and Peter doing a duet.. "I know you're here in my heart..." *one tear*

I just started doing this.

I've been invited to play the game but I didn't seem interested, but last night, I had the time to try it.. and I'm hooked.

So, as part of the game, I'm inviting those who play the game to be part of my posse.

Let's join forces, and be a Top Fashionista and be a true diva! ^_^

This is from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's The Magic Flute, I watched the Philippine Opera Company's staging a few months back.

There have been a lot of performances for this opera and this aria, "Der Hölle Rache", requires a clear pitch and smooth transition without the heavy breathing.

Natalie Dessay has a cool technique! She sings like a bird, and everybody who wants to sing this should. Amazing.

After a very exhausting week of being bed-ridden, I energized myself with a play, Nick Joaquin's A Portrait of an Artist as Filipino at Onstage, Greenbelt, Makati.

I thought of visiting a museum in the morning, but I thought of a long day ahead of me, I continued to rest instead.

I was an hour early, so, as my alternative to the missed museum, I checked Arturo Luz at the Greenbelt Park.

I was told that Arturo Luz is a bad person, that he's not much of an artist, rather has a hidden personality with a dark image.

Of course, I may not know the artist personally, but I admit, that through his art, I could feel that he has something in his mind that doesn't seem well.

Anyway, the play was amazingly perfect.

Repertory Philippines has yet again topped my list as the best theatre organization in the country.

Well, it would be very disappointing if they'd present a half-rehearsed play after they have staged it numerous times for years before.

Rarely do I get goosebumps during scene transition, the closing of the lights and the dramatic lines at the end are some notable details that I noticed but those made me feel light.

The choice of actors was impressive, Irma Adlawan as Candida was confusing for she sometimes has a "terror teacher" attitude but leads a left behind life and Liesl Batucan as Paula deserves a bouquet, she had a flawless acting and developed an accent that was convincing to the role.

While sitting in the middle of the theatre, I started to think that I seem to believe in the improvement of the local theatre audience. Thanks to local crappy television shows, theatre presentations still give that glamour and excitement to some people and still has the impression that it's fun and mind-stimulating.

That evening, a friend called and invited us out, I thought of going to Malate, so we did.

I got a little tipsy and the whole weekend turned out really cool.

I really expect an even beyond great performance of Bare, the Musical from the Ateneo BlueRep (Blue Repertory) this February.

There are plays that I'm planning to see, but I'm really into this Musical that I did research and critics from recordings and YouTube videos, I even read the script available.

The acting was ok.. just ok, nothing impressive to me,.. and the songs, most of them were ruined.. especially Ivy's and sometimes with Peter..

Oh and the scenes, were simply boring... and bland [ exclamation point - font 30. ]

Particularly with "One" where Jason and Ivy had sex, err, made love... that was supposed to be one of the unforgettable scenes.. but it was all trash.

And my personal favorite, "Role of a Lifetime", each sang the song beautifully but the acting was bad.

I keep on thinking and comparing this to YouTube's showdown of Bianca Ryan and Charice Pempengco.. I know, Filipinos see Bianca's performance as oh-so-incomparable to Charice's, in other words, powerless.

On Bare the Musical, it seemed that the western versions were like Bianca Ryan's.. now, I'll see how Ateneo will make this to a worth-restaging gay-themed play.

My fingers are crossedly-crossed.

After I got off work, I went straight home and got dressed and went to watch Dulaang UP's "Atang" as I missed its first staging last November.

The play was fun and really fabulous, there were no parts that I consider as "unsupporting scenes" and I could be bored.

Each scene made me attentive as it is very tasteful from the script, to the acting, to the costumes, to the stage, to the music and choreography, to the actors and the cute chorus guys.. haha. Everything about it was artistically and meticulously formed.

The idea of staging "Atang" may come bland to some people who really don't know the Philippines' "Reina ng Sarsuwela", Honorata 'Atang' dela Rama.. I, myself, only know a little about the actress, but I'm drawn to her as I've read something about Kundiman when I was young and that's how my late grandmother sang to me Dalagang Bukid's "Nabasag ang Banga", [ I kept on recalling where I first heard that so-gay song.. ^_^ ]

Anyway, that night, we had Ayen Munji-Laurel as Gia Almonte and Shamaine Centenera-Buencamino as Atang dela Rama [ I wonder why she's not called Dona Atang ], I guess I won't have the chance to watch the other actors.

Ayen as Gia was really cute, she fits the role but her singing does not.. However, she gave justice to her role as a perky actress who rubs elbows with her idol for her occasional personal gain stuff but she also sometimes looked like a drag queen, who hasn't undergone any sexual reassignment.. there's one where she ended a song that required a high pitch and when she tried, it seemed everybody turned and looked sideways because of uneasiness. *mean.

Shamaine Buencamino as Atang, on the other hand, played her role "perfectly".. in every sense of the word. I adore her.

She was really into it, her great acting contributed to most of the scenes that required shifting from past to the present to tell a great story.. even with soft lights at her, you could feel how brilliant a certain scene turned out because of her supposed-to-be minor part as she tries to look back to her wonderful life to recall it and share.

The playwright, Floy Quintos, definitely did extensive research about the actress, after all, I feel that he was truly inspired in writing and continuing the legacy of one of the foundations of the Philippine theatre.

As a continuation of the Frolics and Pista ng Sto.Nino 2009 celebration last week, I attended my first live Gregorian Chant last night at the Abbey of Our Lady of Montserrat.

The concert is a fund-raising program of the Jubilarian Class for the Pamanang Bedista Heritage Center, called "Gaudete in Domino" (Rejoice in the Lord) and was a pretty cool idea.

Gregorian Chants are sung mainly by monks, but there were the UST Brass Ensemble and the UST Liturgikon as "back-ups" for the night's main scores and I got nice patron seats, one of the few nicest views that night.

The evening was filled with people, especially the convent's, err, monastery's major patrons and supporters in all fields.

Diplomatic and high-profiled people were seated in front of me and I can stab them and be on the headlines tomorrow.. hahah!

Anyway, the church was surrounded with orchestra and acoustics, the orchestra was divided into 4 groups, there's one by the altar, then left and right and the back on the 2nd floor overlooking the church.. and it's cute how the conductor made them do alternating parts.

Classicals were performed and known pieces were played.. of course, some compositions by Benildus Maramba, OSB were presented too.

The performance was perfect and night was relaxing, except I got surprised when I heard the alma mater song changed.. "Through the carefree days of our boyhood childhood.. And the visions of our youth..". Damn the Co-Ed thing.