Live!

Friday, March 26, was the awarding of the 2009 Gawad Buhay!, the Philstage Awards for the Performing Arts, at the Tanghalang Aurelio Tolentino of the Cultural Center of the Philippines. This is only the second year of the award, which recognizes and pays tribute to Filipino artists in theater—plays, musicals and dance. Depending on how it's accented, the word buhay can mean life, live or alive; in this case, the name of the award refers to the fact that the award is for live performances.




The awarding was broken up into several sets, with various groups performing excerpts from their 2009 season. The most electrifying performance for me was that of Ballet Philippines. Candice Adea, who won a Gawad Buhay! for Best Female Lead Performance in Dance, and Angel Gabriel danced an excerpt from Evacuation, choreographed by Bam Damian. (Please pardon the noise and fuzziness of this photo; the conditions were almost too much for my little camera and I was forced to maximize the ISO.)




To showcase the works of Filipino visual artists, and also as an added incentive for theater groups to strive to garner awards every year, the trophies of Gawad Buhay! will always be different. The 2009 trophy is created by Don Salubayba from Davao City. It portrays a dancing bulul, the rice god of the Northern Philippines' indigenous peoples. The three faces of the figure represent music, dance and theater.




A notable difference between this year's awarding ceremony and last year's is the number of artists who attended. Last year, it was easy to organize the small group onto the stage for their photo. This year…




Chaotic is a mild word to describe what happened during the photo opportunity, but I love it. Half a dozen performing arts groups on one stage, happy faces showing pride in their awards, and a gaggle of friends, relatives and colleagues trying to get photos. As a scriptwriter friend told my husband after the ceremony, the artists now own the awards. And that can only bode well for Gawad Buhay!, Philstage and Philippine performing arts.

For those interested, Gibbs Cadiz posted the complete list of 2009 Gawad Buhay! winners in his blog.

Ballet as educational entertainment

The teenagers yesterday were lined up to watch Ballet Manila's original two-act Filipino ballet "Alamat: Si Sibol at Si Gunaw" (Legend: Bloom and Doom). Based on an illustrated children's book written by Ed Maranan, the ever-old, ever-new story contrasts love of family vs. love of power and teaches children to care for our environment. The original choreography and the costumes were based on Filipino folkloric traditions, most of them from Filipino Muslim culture. The production was a spectacle of colors and special effects, with the mother goddess Luningning (Brilliance), danced by Lisa Macuja-Elizalde, flying between heaven and earth on a moving platform attached to a track on the ceiling or using a harness. Ballet purists would have gone into conniptions, and at first, I also found it odd to see ballerinas in tribal costumes dancing en pointe but then I thought, "Why not?" Who says that ballets have to have tutus and European costumes? When I got over that hump, I could accept the production for what it was and had a grand time. The teenagers obviously had no such preconceptions and thoroughly enjoyed the ballet, judging from their enthusiastic applause throughout the performance.

Unbelievable

Would you believe hundreds of 16 to 18 year old first year college students orderly and patiently lined up to watch a ballet? By the time Ballet Manila's performance started in the Aliw Theater, there were about a thousand of them. And even more astounding, they actually enjoyed it! Tomorrow, I'll show you why.

Ongaku in Motion

One of the perks of working at a university is the wide range of learning opportunities right at our doorstep. And no, they are not all dry lectures. Last month, the Ateneo de Manila's Japanese Studies Program, with the assistance of the Japan Information and Cultural Center of the Embassy of Japan, celebrated the Philippines-Japan Friendship Month with "Ongaku in Motion." Ongaku means music in Japanese. The first half of the program featured traditional Japanese music and dance. This is a koto, which is the national instrument of Japan.



After several pieces of koto music, played by the Director of the Japanese Studies Program and a member of the University of the Philippines Koto Ensemble, one faculty member performed a Nihon Buyo dance. It was fascinating with its slow, exact and refined movements.



Unfortunately, I couldn't stay for the second half of the program, which featured J-pop and anime music performed by the students.