Lofty rhytms, Sacred music

THe International Bamboo Organ Festival held annually in Las Piñas for almost three decades has consistently provided the Manila music scene with performances of exceptional quality. The festival, centering on the Las Piñas Church’s celebrated bamboo organ, also focuses attention on organ and choral music not usually performed in Manila’s concert halls.

This year’s festival, held from February 27 to March 5, provided a special treat in presenting organist Jennifer Pascual, the new Director of Music at the Cathedral of St. Patrick in New York City, one of the most prestigious sacred music positions in the United States. Dr. Pascual’s appointment is a milestone in many ways: she is the youngest, the first woman and the first Asian-American to hold this eminent position.

Announcing her appointment last September 2003, His Eminence Edward Cardinal Egan said, "All of us here in the Archdiocese of New York are delighted that Dr. Pascual has accepted the position. (Her) work is well known throughout the metropolitan area. She is a distinguished organist and choral director, and we look forward to many years of splendid liturgical music under her direction at our beloved cathedral."

Cardinal Egan was in the audience at a Christmas concert in 2002 at a seminary in New York where Dr. Pascual conducted the choir and played the organ. That performance must have so impressed the Cardinal that she was among those considered for the music directorship.

She was chosen after an extensive search, explains cathedral rector Msgr. Eugene Clark, who added that "Dr. Pascual will be a wonderful addition to the cathedral family and staff." Dr. Pascual performed her first Sunday mass in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, considered the center of Catholic life in the U.S., on September 7, 2003 at the 10:15 a.m. mass.

As music director, she is responsible for choosing all the music at the cathedral. There are 17 weekday masses and five masses each on Saturday and Sunday, all with music, from choral anthems to hymns to the "Gloria" and "Holy! Holy!" In addition, she directs the church’s 50-voice choir and oversees the church’s choral concerts, the Sunday afternoon organ series and over 40 organ recitals held throughout the year.

St. Patrick’s has two other full-time organists; the cathedral has three organs, including the great organ installed in 1931 after extensive renovation of the church’s interior enlarged the sanctuary space. The present cathedral structure was started in 1858 and is the largest decorated Gothic-style cathedral in the world. Drawing over three million visitors a year, it features the famed rose window, considered the best work of Charles Connick, the 20th century genius of stained glass window design.

Born in Los Angeles in 1971, Jenny’s family moved to Jacksonville, Florida where she began piano lessons at the age of five. In 1992 she graduated with Bachelor’s Degrees in Piano and Organ Performance and Music Education, magna cum laude, from Jacksonville University. Three years later she got her Master’s degree in Piano Performance from Mannes College in New York, studying under master teacher Nina Svetlanova. In 2001, she graduated from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York with a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Organ Performance with a minor in Church Music.

She is the recipient of numerous scholarships and distinctions, including the Paderewski Medal. She was a finalist in the 1990 Florida First Coastal Classical Piano Competition. She undertook Gregorian Chant studies at the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music in Rome and trained at the Goteborg International Organ Academy in Sweden.

Since her teens, Jenny has been active in church music ministries as organist, pianist and instructor in churches around Jacksonville. She continued her involvement in church music when she moved to New York in 1993 to further her studies, serving as choirmaster and music director in various churches in the archdiocese. She was a member of the New York Archdiocesan Choir during Pope John Paul II’s visit to New York in 1995 as well as the late Cardinal O’Connor’s 50th anniversary to the priesthood celebration. From 1994 until the present, she serves as rehearsal accompanist for the Boys Choir of Harlem.

Her performances at the Bamboo Organ Festival was a homecoming of sorts for the charming and ebullient Jenny. Her mother Adelia hails from Las Piñas, and it was an extremely proud de la Cruz clan that cheered her opening night performance, when she very ably played Soler’s The Emperor’s Fanfare, Haydn’s The Musical Clocks, Mozart’s Andante in F Major and Bach’s Dies sind die heil’gen zehn Gebot. Her touch was at times light and fanciful (in the enchanting Haydn minuets and marches), yet full and powerful when needed, belying the difficulty that playing on the centuries old bamboo organ presents.

She played a full, varied and challenging repertoire in a solo concert on the leap day of the year, on both the bamboo organ and the auditorium’s regular organ. The appreciative audience thrilled to works by Bach, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Zipoli and Cabanilles, as well as modern composers Guy Bovet, Derek Bourgeois and... Jennifer Pascual!

She relished the chance to perform before a hometown audience, giving her relations here a chance to hear her play without having to fly stateside. A previous visit in 1989 did not present that opportunity, and it was around two years ago that she seriously sought out the possibility of performing at the Bamboo Organ Festival, which has established a solid reputation internationally and has drawn some of the major names in organ music.

With Jenny Pascual, the festival has added another feather to its cap, and the country has an artist of whom it can truly and justifiably be proud.