Fifty golden years

This evening – Saturday, October 4 – the "Original Ateneo Alumni Glee Club" will perform at 8:00 p.m., in the beautiful new theater of Saint Paul College of Quezon City, on the corner of Aurora Boulevard and Gilmore.

They have been singing together for fifty years. What follows is their own reflection on the bond that has held them together since 1953, for half a century:

As all legends go, there are many versions of how the legendary Ateneo Glee Club came to being. Trying to look back at those wonderful, enjoyable years of music and camaraderie, tears are hard to hold back even as memories are only a fuzzy haze made even dimmer by age. But pieces of tales picked up from here and there create a soft, emerging montage of those glorious years fifty years ago when we, who are grandfathers now, were sons; and we, who are old men now, were boys who simply loved to sing.

It was in school years 1952-53 at the new Loyola Heights when a group of College Freshmen, fresh from the old Padre Faura campus, got together bonded by their common love for singing and started jamming during their free time. Alran Bengzon, Joe Castro, Tancio de Leon, Dick Chua, Bobby Paterno, Totit Olivares, Hernando Veloso, Rodolfo Severino, Titus Concio, Manny Bravo, Tony Romualdez and Boy Mendoza made up the group. We later recruited Rey Vito, who was the only one who could read music. He played the organ, which we lugged around wherever we went. We began to practice at Joe Castro’s house in Malate.

When Christmas came around, we went caroling. One of the stops was the Jesuit residence at Loyola Heights. Among the Jesuits who came to the windows to look down and listen was Fr. Reuter, and standing next to him was Fr. James McMahon S.J. , then Rector and President of the Ateneo. Fr. McMahon was himself a former glee clubber, having sung as a baritone in the Holy Cross Glee Club. He must have been pleased with what he heard. He suggested to Fr. Reuter to form a Glee Club inasmuch as down there was a bunch of boys who could form the core. The following year, the Original Ateneo Glee Club was formalized. It was 1953.

Over the long years, our club has included Jun Siazon, who became the Secretary of Foreign Affairs; Francis Garchitorena, who was the Chief Justice of the Sandigan Bayan ; Vic Sison, who was Mr. Football, Noel McRae, who earned the highest marks ever recorded at the British University in Leeds; Ed Triviño, Fred Rodriguez, Mike Divino, Gil Yuzon, Spanky and Oscar Nepomuceno, Ramon Enriquez, Ducky Paredes, Ramon Cardenas, Roman Cruz, Wild Bill Corneby.

We have left our mark on the school. We were the club who first sang the graduation Hymn, which is sung by heart at every Ateneo graduation, to this day.

Auditions brought in a motley crew. Nonoy Mirasol was an excellent ROTC Commandant, but he couldn’t carry a tune, Leony Gonzales got by faking most of the lyrics, claiming he was singing falsetto. Auditions were held every afternoon after classes, from 2:30 to 5:30. The auditionee was asked to sing his favorite song after which Fr. Reuter determined his range and assigned him to a voice section. Fr. Reuter was young and very generous. Butz Aquino sang Bahay Kubo for his audition piece and Tony Mercado recited Shakespeare. One audition and that was it. Either you made it or you did. No one was ever rejected. Enthusiasm and a desire to sing, were the only requirements.

Glee Club practices were held at the auditorium on the 3rd floor of what we then knew only as the Chemistry building, which also housed the college chapel and the cafeteria on the ground floor. First and Second tenors practiced every Tuesday, the First and Second Basses on Thursdays, and everyone came on Sunday mornings from 9:30 to 12 noon. Most of us came by bus and had to walk almost a kilometer to and from the old Katipunan road and the Chemistry building. Very few of us could read notes then, except Tim Galvez who could play the piano.

The first ever formal performance of the Ateneo Glee Club was during the First Quarterly reading of honors sometime in September 1953, FIFTY YEARS AGO THIS MONTH!

Our first REAL public performance, however, was across the creek at Maryknoll College during a mid-morning convocation. Being the first males to be allowed to walk into the hallowed halls of that bastion of femininity, we naturally caused a palpable stir. We could hear the clearly audible heavy breathing and sighs as Bobby Paterno sang the solo in the song If I Loved You! It wasn’t only his voice that was quivering.

The Glee Club’s first provincial sortie was St. Paul College in Vigan, Ilocos Sur. We were billeted in the school’s classrooms, where all the beds and beddings were loaned to the school by the families of the students.

One of our most memorable performances was at the Women’s Correctional Facility in Mandaluyong, where one of the female inmates sang a beautiful number, which we all applauded lustily. She was incarcerated for a very high profile murder.

Our regular concert was divided into three segments, featuring Negro spirituals in the beginning, love songs and Broadway musicals after the first intermission, and Tagalog Kundimans in the final portion.

We had our own intermission numbers. The first intermission group was the Trio Los Quatros made up of Joe Castro, Nene Syquia, Dick Chua and Bobby Paterno who sang Maria Dolores, Ay, Ay, Nenita Ko, Angelitos Negros, later adding the Tagalog parody Pintor and Te Quiero, Dejiste.

Another well-applauded intermission number was the late Tony Mercado declaming in parody Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, brandishing a bedsheet stained with Mercurochome, as Caesar’s bloody toga.

The Nightmares truly lived up to their name. Jesse Paredes, Nonoy Mirasol, Boy Bueno, Donnie Gallardo, Gene Ealdama, Art Alafriz and Ben Nuñez made up the riotous group.

They were later augmented by the Alley Cats, made up of Butz Aquino, Corky Trinidad, Kiko Rallonza, George Balagtas, Dicky de Leon, King Rodrigo, Boy Ampil, Susing Pineda, Joe Avelino and Ben Nuñez.

But the group that went on to theatrical fame was the Loonylarks made up of Ed Gatchalian, Albert Grupe, Sonny Marabut, Resty Lerma, Joe de Guzman, Subas Herrero and Noel Trinidad. Noel proudly adds that he was the only one who graduated "on time" in 1962.

From Laoag and Candon in the North to Bacolod in the South the Ateneo Glee Club serenaded many campuses, mostly all-girl colleges, and won many hearts – at least that’s what we like to think. We were fed well by nuns – most from St. Paul’s, but also from Maryknoll, Assumption, College of the Holy Spirit, Sienna College–walked out on by His Eminence, the late Rufino J. Cardinal Santos.

For the love of singing, and the strong bond of friendship that has kept us coming back to sing together, we have kept the Original Ateneo Glee Club going. We have sung for visiting dignitaries, and for orphans. We have sung with female glee clubs and children’s choirs. We have sung for 50 GOLDEN YEARS and we know we have much more singing left. We will keep singing until the final curtain drops.

Until our diamond Jubilee.