Serenading the nation

Do young people today know what harana is all about? They should because harana is cool. I remember in my youth in Borongan, Eastern Samar that it was a precious courtship ritual. Those were the days when love was still a many splendoured thing and not “Judas.”

The Philippine Opera Company’s Ang Bagong Harana, directed by award-winning director and writer Floy Quintos, will return on stage at the Carlos P. Romulo Theater, RCBC Plaza tomorrow, June 6 to June 10. 

Last year, in the midst of several foreign pop acts and imported musicals, one small theatrical effort made waves. It was a revue featuring traditional and contemporary Filipino songs, sung not by the established legends of classical singing but by a troupe of 10 young, relatively unknown but dedicated classical singers. The show was the Philippine Opera Company’s Ang Bagong Harana. It was a show that had the audience who came to see it for four nights at the RCBC Theater, weeping and applauding with joy.

What was the secret of this small revue’s success? “Ang Bagong Harana was envisioned as love song to our country,” says Karla Gutierrez who heads the Philippine Opera Company. “We wanted to show audiences that there is so much wealth that modern Filipinos can mine from our traditional and contemporary music. In this age of globalization, it is all the more crucial for us to know who we are and what we have that we can call Pinoy. A lot of performers may say that we are the best in the world. But we wanted to go a step further and prove it by using our own traditional and contemporary material. And we wanted to showcase young singers who have committed themselves to classical singing and to our traditional material.”

The company of 10 singers is made up of theater actors and singers Karla Gutierrez, Aizel Prietos, Charley Magalit, Janine Santos, Marian Santiago, Lawrence Jatayna, Jack Salud, Nazer Salcedo, Marvin Gayramon and Al Gatmaitan. Most have appeared in plays and musicals. None of them are what you would call mainstream. And that is precisely what makes their performances all the more poignant and powerful.

The show, which was conceived by Floy, begins with an evocation of a lost innocence, as expressed through traditional children’s songs sung by the company. From there, the love song to country moves through various evocations — a kundiman suite, framed against the backdrop of revolution; a tribal suite based on the indigenous respect for the environment; a suite of folk songs framed against the backdrop of a fiesta; a tribute to Sylvia La Torre that reconnects with our bodabil roots. But more than just mining the past, Ang Bagong Harana moves swiftly into the present, using OPM classics like Freddie Aguilar’s Anak to make pointed social commentary.

“We kept getting inquiries about a repeat run which is why we are bringing back the show in its original form, with most of the original cast. It is a difficult effort to try and do something truly Filipino nowadays. But after the warm response that we got last year, we know that there is an audience that is hungry for this kind of entertainment that reconnects us to our souls. In this age of globalization, it’s the one thing we cannot face the future without,” enthuses Karla.

Ang Bagong Harana will have a re-run on June 6 to 9 at 8 p.m. with matinees at 3:30 p.m. on June 9 and 10 at the Carlos P. Romulo Theater, RCBC Plaza, Makati.

For details, call the Philippine Opera Company at 881-7168 or 0917-5272880 or TicketWorld at 891-9999 or like the Philippine Opera Company on Facebook.