Bringing the classics to Juan & Juana

We sat transfixed in our seats, watching the full house of the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) main theater, standing and cheering like we’ve never seen before. We ourselves had to plead with a friend to accompany us to The Legends and The Classics Encore. “Sige na nga,” he told us. “Pero I warn you, I get bored easily and fall asleep.”

We took a look at our friend beside us. He was still wide awake and would remain so until the end of the concert. “This is world-class talent,” he said of singer Lea Salonga, pianist Cecile Licad and prima ballerina Lisa Macuja-Elizalde.

As a follower of mainstream Broadway musicals which have often had their birth in a story or a movie, we are more comfortable with the medium. Ergo, we are more familiar with Lea who started her career as a child star with Repertory Philippines, went on to various roles with Rep, until her breakthrough as the lead star Kim for Miss Saigon at the West End in 1989.

From London, Miss Saigon went to Broadway and there was no stopping Lea. She has won the Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and Theatre World awards. She has appeared as Eponine in Les Miserables; Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady; the Witch in Into the Woods; Mei-Li in Flower Drum Song; Fantine in Les Mis; Grizabella in Cats, plus innumerable voicings of Disney characters; coaching for The Voice of the Philippines; and The Legends and The Classics.

We are less familiar with Cecile and Lisa, since we were one of those whom our mother required us to take up piano and ballet lessons as a child, even when we knew we had two left feet and seven fingers that refused to follow directions.

However, we can truly say that the two-and-a-half hour concert with no intermission taught us how to appreciate the classics, even if our appreciation for composers stopped with Beethoven and Prokofiev whom our doctor uncle loved to play over and over again. Cecile has been called “a pianist’s pianist” by the New Yorker for her blend of daring musical instinct and superb training. Like all great artists, Cecile began playing the piano at age three, and at seven, made her debut as soloist with the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Philippines. Her talent was honed by Rudolf Serkin, Seymour Lipkin and Mieczyslaw Horszowski, three of the best teachers and performers at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From then on, the world has been Cecile’s audience as she has toured and performed with orchestras, for chamber symphonies, as a solo performer or with others. 

When it came to dancing, few can equal the numerous citations and awards that Lisa has collected through the years. All these occurred within 28 years of dancing the lead in 90 cities and five continents and in over 300 full-length ballets.

However, to us and the rest of the world, Lisa’s greatest gift to humanity is her tireless program of bringing ballet to the people and the people to ballet. As a student of ballet at age eight, she became the first foreigner invited to join the Kirov Ballet of Russia as soloist. But she returned to the Philippines, formed her own company Ballet Manila and started training talented boys and girls to dance for free.

The Legends and The Classics Encore was a repeat of an earlier concert of the three icons in the industry. However, some changes included Francisco Llorin as cellist, the ABS-CBN Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Maestro Gerard Salonga and for Lisa, a new lease on performing life after her doctor told her that the cartilage on her ankles had been worn thin and she soon needed to retire.

It does seem that Lisa will need to spend more time on production, on teaching and on furthering her dream of bringing the classics to every talented Juan and Juana de la Cruz in the country.

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