The Spy in the Sandwich

Monday, June 18, 2018

3:07 AM | Soaring Sound

The choir started singing Mozart’s Requiem on an early Sunday evening—it was the June 17th, at the tail-end of Father’s Day—and we were transfixed by the music until the very end. When the performance was over, no one moved; no one could quite believe it was finished and felt there should have been more. More music, another piece perhaps. [There was alas no encore.]

That pregnant expectation for more was very much a testament to the performance by Ating Pamana/Silliman University Gratitude and Goodwill Ambassador, directed by Elizabeth Susan Vista-Suarez—and it was without question superb, the kind of performance you know has been wrought by someone who is equal to the passion and to the demands of the music.

Once again, Dr. Suarez has demonstrated the immense gift she has in conducting music: exquisitely aware of how to “timpla” sound [her word], eschewing the loudness that has come to characterize much of the country’s choral efforts and believing instead in precision, in massaging the notes and the spaces between them just enough to create a richness that is also about finesse. In her program, the famously unfinished piece by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart felt quite finished—although she did take care to include the pieces composed by Francois Xavier Süssmayer to finish out the composition after Mozart’s death. (Süssmayer had been a pupil of Mozart and had been much with him during the time he had worked on the Requiem.) From Dies Irae to Tuba Mirum to Rex Tremendae Majestatis, from Recordare to Confutatis Maledictis to Domine Jesu, from Hostias to Lacrymosa to Sanctus and Hosanna, and from Benedictus to Agnus Dei, the choir conquered each movement with panache, each voice vibrant—and I could only imagine the what-if had this also have been accompanied by a full orchestra. But I’ll take my blessings where I can. As it is, the choir was the star.

It goes without saying that Dr. Suarez and the Ating Pamana/Silliman University Gratitude and Goodwill Ambassador deserved the applause they finally got: hearty—and grateful. It did feel that way, the applause. Because listening to music such as this was indeed a gift.

Was this a good choice to open the 56th Cultural Season of Silliman University? By all accounts, it was. As a season opener, it was a good harbinger for things still come—and the cultural calendar is without question chockfull of delightfully anticipated events, including the Philippine Madrigal Singers, the ABS-CBN Philharmonic Orchestra, and Ballet Philippines.

But to go back to Mozart Requiem…

The sound. Let us talk about that heavenly sound which reverberated around the Ariniego Art Gallery in a kind of fullness I have never heard before in any other venue in Dumaguete City. There was an uncanny precision even to the echoes. Can you imagine music “soaring”? I have always read that description, and it is in fact a cliché. But the performance demonstrated exactly this effect, and it made all the difference. And it occurred to me that this was always the dream. Once upon a time, in 2014, a group of us—Diomar Abrio, Grace Sumalpong, Leo Mamicpic, Edna Mijares, Annabelle Lee Adriano, Moses JoshuaAtega, and a bunch of others—went to Tagaytay City for dinner with Dr. Romeo Ariniego after having invaded his art collection at his house in Dasmariñas, Cavite, which later on became his fondest donation to Silliman University.

We were frank with our wishes: that perhaps we could have an art gallery to house it all, and that perhaps we could have an art gallery to also function as a venue where we could have a more intimate time with chamber music and choral music, even poetry readings, surrounded by great art. (The Luce was beautiful and grand—but it was too big for certain things.)

We had no idea Dr. Ariniego was listening to us intently in Tagaytay, and three years later, we now have that building that the Silliman University Culture and Arts Council and a bunch of Manila alumni were only wishing about years ago.

This was always the plan for the Ariniego Art Gallery—and when we approved the final architectural design, we took note of that as well, first in giving the specifications, and then finally in choosing the design that best fitted all our expectations.

But there’s art here, and there’s finally music in it too.

And tonight, listening to Ating Pamana sing so magnificently, the genius of Mozart splendidly evoked, all was right in the world.