Mouron, the Mangyans and The Mandarin: Why French love songs truly electrify

Hubert d’Aboville fell in love with the Philippines 30 years ago this month, to be exact. He also fell in love with a Filipina and so his love affair with the Philippines endured, like a classic and engrossing French chanson.

Hubert and his Filipino wife Ara, a former hotel executive, then fell in love with the town of Puerto Galera in Oriental Mindoro. Hubert, president of the European Chamber of Commerce in the Philippines, first went to the rustic coastal town as a backpacker, and Ara, as a tourist seeking solitude.

She recalls falling asleep on a rickety ferryboat, and awakening only as the boat was gliding inside Puerto Galera Bay and she blinked, sat up and thought that paradise was before her. It was, indeed.

The D’Abovilles and their four children have since made Puerto Galera their second home. Hubert has in fact taken the initiative of having Puerto Galera Bay named one of the “Most Beautiful Bays in the World.” Only 33 bays in the world are members of this elite group.

The D’Abovilles have become nurturing neighbors to the Iraya Mangyan community (one of seven Mangyan tribes on the island, the Manyans’ only home) in Puerto Galera. In fact, they have built a replica of a Mangyan village in their sprawling mountainside home in the town, which may be reached via a 60-minute boat ride from the Batangas pier.

The French-born Hubert says that 10 percent of the one million residents of Oriental Mindoro are Mangyans, and many of these gentle, peace-loving people are marginalized, driven up the mountains to eke out an existence.

But the tools of modern life have found their way to the Mangyan culture, and a good number of them have cell phones.

“The problem,” says Hubert, who spearheaded an electrification project in Masbate in 2005, “is that the Mangyans have to leave their village to have their cell phones charged!”

The jolting truth is that the barangay of the Iraya Mangyans is the only barangay in Puerto Galera without electricity. Hubert recently visited their barangay and found that even their 40-sq.-meter barangay hall is dilapidated.

Olivia d’Aboville.

“Before we even think of bringing electricity here, we have to rebuild this structure, which is the heart of the barangay,” says Hubert.

Hubert, who speaks Tagalog virtually like a Pinoy, believes that to spread peace in the Philippines, the people have to spread their blessings.

One of nine children of a devoutly Catholic Parisian couple, Hubert convinced the French government in 2005 to extend a 17.5 million euro soft loan to the Philippines for an electrification project in Masbate, which has benefitted 18,000 families.

He hopes to do the same for the Iraya Mangyans. But first, he wants to build their barangay hall.

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A French diva named Mouron is performing at the Mandarin Oriental tomorrow and on Saturday, and though she and the Mangyans are worlds apart, her chansons will bridge the gap.

A chanson is a lyric-based French loves song, something like Edith Piaf’s La Vie en Rose.

Mouron, which is also the name of a little white flower that birds feed on in the fields of France, described to me what a chanson really is during a welcome lunch at the Mandarin’s Tivoli, where she, ironically, ordered sushi.

Hubert d’Aboville with the Iraya Mangyans of Puerto Galera.

“In a chanson, the words, the lyrics are very important. It’s not only la-la-la, it’s not only the melody. In a chanson, you create your songs for the stage, not only for recording. The emotion is very important. The chanson is not more than three or four minutes, but you put your entire life into these three or four minutes. You have to give birth to this song otherwise it’s just la-la-la.”

She sings, a cappella, a line or two from a chanson that was totally unfamiliar to me. But those two lines left me enchanted, enthralled.

“In a chanson, words find their way to the audience, and the audience feels the beauty of the words,” says the Marseille-born Mouron.

Mouron performs at the Mandarin Oriental Lounge tomorrow, April 1 and at the Tivoli on Saturday, April 2, singing French love songs of Edith Piaf, Jacques Brel, among others. 

Her performances at the Mandarin are part of her 2011 Asian Tour — proceeds of which go to D’Aboville Foundation’s reforestation and rural electrification projects for the Iraya Mangyan community in Puerto Galera.

The foundation is headed by Hubert D’Aboville. An artwork of Hubert and Ara’s talented daughter Olivia will be auctioned on that night as well.

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Mouron’s story begins in Marseille, where she was born into a musical family: her father was a singer at the opera, and her mother a songwriter. With this background, it’s no wonder that she soon felt the urge to write her own songs. At the age of 12 she began to write chansons, and soon, she had the desire to perform them!

When she was barely 17, she played in France’s most famous music hall, L’Olympia, with the hot French group of the late ‘70s, “Michel Fugain & Le Big Bazar.” She launched her first single with original lyrics in the national hit parade. Soon composers such as Romain Didier, touched by her words, began to write music for her and they helped launch Mouron’s solo career. Her first solo show, “Made in Moon,” took off from the small stage of Le Piano Zinc in Paris. Quickly, it transferred to the Festival d’Avignon, and played at major theatres throughout the country. A successful tour through Belgium, Switzerland, Egypt, Poland and Germany followed.

In 1995 she met the German cabaret star Georgette Dee and British pianist Terry Truck, who decided to produce her in Germany. Two years later they recorded her album “Mouron d’Amour” with Terry Truck as musical director and arranger. Since then, Mouron has continued to perform with Terry Truck, who is going to perform with her at the Mandarin.

(For inquiries, please call the Mandarin Oriental at 750-8888.)

(You may e-mail me at jo[email protected])