A town sitting on a music ‘gold mine’

I had the privilege of attending a town fiesta celebration that’s quite different from the genre of the Ati-Atihan, Sinulog, Dinagyang, and MassKara festivals. Instead of the usual costumed street dancers as main features with musicians as mere accompaniments, the main attractions this time were the musical bands, and the garbed dancers were the sideshows.

I traveled to Santa Maria, Bulacan, last Saturday to join my wife and friends in order to experience what’s hushed around as the thriving culture of musicians in the town. Santa Maria holds a month-long fiesta celebration this February in honor of its patroness saint, La Purisima Concepcion. The festivities included, so far, a parade performance by a total 17 music bands, four of which are homegrown, while the rest are bands invited from other towns and provinces.

There were two consecutive Saturdays when the homegrown bands, in pairs, serenaded the patroness in the public plaza fronting the Catholic church. I attended the second night when Banda 85 and Banda 31 Original performed. The numbers correspond to the year when each band was formed, so one was formed in 1985 and the other in 1931. An even older band, Banda 88, was founded 134 years ago in 1888, a testament to the very long tradition of musicians in the town. What a feast to the ears it was, listening to each band perform a repertoire of 10 pieces each of classic marching band music, kundiman pieces, Filipino pop songs, and foreign contemporary tunes.

Each of the homegrown bands have 90 members each, on average. It was inspiring to see so many wind instruments like saxophones, trumpets, French horns, trombones, euphoniums, tubas, clarinets, and other wind, percussion, and brass instruments being played up close for free in a public space. The two bands I saw perform have multiple members who are either pursuing music degrees in college or are professional members of symphony orchestras in Metro Manila. I saw two girls, 10 and 14 years old, who played the clarinet and French horn, respectively.

I met one of the two conductors of Banda 31 Original, the young and very talented Michael Jacinto who is a University of Santo Tomas faculty member and associate conductor of the UST and Manila Philharmonic orchestras. As a young boy, Jacinto frequented a local band’s “kademyahan,” (the practice session venue of local bands), learned solfeggio (music note reading) at nine years old, started playing a euphonium at 12 years old, and began conducting music bands at the young age of 20. Scholarships enabled him to earn undergraduate and graduate music degrees at UST, and he has attended further studies in Thailand and Germany. He has conducted for musical plays like “Ang Huling El Bimbo” and “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.” Jacinto is very passionate about helping cultivate the Filipino innate love for music by helping train musical instrument talents in the provinces. He is a protégé of Maestro Herminigildo G. Ranera, conductor of the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra, who, to my pleasant surprise, played the euphonium as an ordinary band member in both Banda 85 and Banda 31 under the batons of younger conductors.

Music groups thrive in a community usually because of hefty and sustained support from the local government, corporate benefactors, and big-hearted private individuals. I was surprised and saddened to learn that the homegrown bands of Santa Maria are thriving despite trifling support from both public and private sources. This speaks of how passionate local residents are for their bands, and how deeply imbedded in the local culture the love for melodies is.

Santa Maria is sitting on a “gold mine,” and it should embark on multiple programs to support its bands, give scholarships to its music talents from elementary to college, and provide funding for regular music performances in its public venues. The town should elevate its thriving music culture from a mere backyard industry to a well-funded and professionally run program capable of producing talents who can compete nationally and internationally.

The soul of our country is music. We are known worldwide as talented singers and musicians. If only our government embarks on comprehensive and well-meaning programs in our communities to seek out, train, and support our outstanding musicians and singers, we would be a nation exporting talent instead of muscle.

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