More on the Rondalla Festival

Precious Southdale babies outside the Oriental Negros Convention Center right before the matinee started. (Teacher Merle, Gabby, Raffy, Abby, Nicole, Carla, and Dom)




The Russian Quartet Phoenix

Sheer passion for their art! They played with an intensity and emotion never before seen in Dumaguete. It was not merely a case of the artist playing a musical instrument. It was a passionate fusion of the man and the instrument creating beautiful music as one.

The audience was awestruck! No polite applause here. Our hands ached all throughout their performance.

Wish we could have more of these cultural shows here, like move the entire Cultural Center of Philippines to Dumaguete or something ...

Singapore Rondalla

Don't bother to look for artistry here. By their own admission, they are a fledgling group started 5 months ago - but they promised to be famous in two years' time.

Their really, really charming musical director played a game with us ... they played a few notes and made us guess what it was ... to our surprise, it was DANDANSOY!!! - a beautifully haunting 100% Filipino folksong.

By the way, I was the one who guessed it! Yes, thank you, thank you ... I was great back there, ha ha ha! They should have made me take a bow at the stage!

Their playing was tentative, the arrangements the simplest there are, but by gosh, they charmed us out of our seats! They played Bahay Kubo and another Filipino folk song. What Filipino could resist that? If there would be any voting on the most likable group, they'd win hands down.

La Rondalla Magisterial Procrea (Mexico)

Latin machos. Pure entertainment value. No magic there. But it was fun. Until the policitians went onstage and danced La Bamba with them ... I could puke!

I finally realized it's election season once again! Now I'm really puking!