Pasinaya 2012

Last Sunday, February 26, I went with three of my old friends to Pasinaya CCP Open House Festival. It features numerous performances from the country's finest artists like the Madrigal Singer, Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra, Ballet Philippines, Ramon Obusan Folkloric Group, as well as regional cultural groups. The one-day event began at 8 in the morning and ended at 7:30 in the evening. Performances and activities include singing, theater acting, dancing, story telling, film showing, and workshops.

It was open to public but to get in you have to buy a Php 20 worth of ticket. Since Ana works for the media, she was able to get us free passes. After securing our passes, we were each given a pamphlet where you can see the scheduled performances. First thing we saw was the cultural dance number of the Marikina Dance Guild.

Marikina Dance Guild performs a Filipino traditional dance, Tinikling

4:30 p.m. we went to the CCP Library for the story telling of my favorite blogger and artist, Lourd de Veyra.

We then went back out  and saw the performance of the FEU Bamboo Band at 5:30 p.m.

FEU Bamboo Band

My favorite performance of them all, and I am pretty sure I am not alone in this opinion, was the one delivered by the Iloilo City National High School students; the Dinagyang dance. Incidentally, it is the main event of this year's Pasinaya. They performed four times, first was at 10:40 a.m., then 12:00 noon, third's at 3:00 p.m., and lastly at 6:30 p.m. just before the curtain call. I tell you they were sooo good! It's the kind that would make you want to get up on your feet and dance. Their movements were fluid and well-coordinated, the dance sequence has dynamics and they were wearing interesting and colorful costumes. Needless to say I was quite impressed; damn these kids are really something. I actually recorded their performance, it's just taking me forever to upload it on Youtube, but I'll try my best to post it here one of these days.  

Dinagyang dance

Now this is me with my friends, Christine, Ana, and Tina. They were my classmates from college. I was of course happy to be with my girls again.

L-R: Christine, me, Ana, Tina

Since we met in the afternoon we didn't get to catch as much performances as we would have wanted, in fact, we weren't able to see the shows of the big performers that I mentioned earlier. Even so I'm still glad that we came to the event because it is not like we get a chance to see these great artists perform every day. We were quite amazed and entertained and I sure hope to be in the same event again next year.