Rossini’s Barber of Seville.
Donizetti’s Lucia de Lammermoor and Elisir d’ Amore.
Puccini’s Turandot.
PPO and Cecile Licad at the Carnegie Hall.
Zenaida “Nedy” R. Tantoco — patron of the arts and one of the moving spirits behind above-mentioned landmark musical events — will be given a special musical tribute on her 78th birthday on July 20, 2024, 7:15 p.m. at the CCP Black Box Theater.
The musical tribute will feature some of the artists whose careers Tantoco has supported including the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra.
Tantoco served in the CCP board 2002 to 2021 and was responsible for the revival of the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra Society, Inc. (PPOSI), the support arm of the national orchestra.
Margie Moran Floirendo has been named the interim PPOSI president in place of Tantoco.
The CCP said the 19 years of Tantoco as trustee defined her unwavering love for arts and culture.
The CCP said Tantoco planned several fundraising efforts to help the CCP resident companies and raised funds for purchase of new musical instruments and repairs for aging ones. Tantoco was instrumental in bringing the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra (PPO) to the prestigious Carnegie Hall in New York.
As opera impresario, Tantoco helped mount opera productions at the CCP namely Rossini’s Barber of Seville, Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore (The Elixir of Love) in 2017, Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor in 2020, and Puccini’s Turandot in 2022, among others.
Tenor Arthur Espiritu remembers the opera producer after the last performance of Lucia de Lammermoor at the CCP in 2020. “After the opening night, she gave me a wonderful barong as a gift with a personal note. She told me, ‘I hope you will enjoy this little token of my appreciation for your great performance. It’s good quality barong and will last you for a while.’ I felt that she really puts her heart into what she is doing.”
Espiritu deviated from the question that everybody was asking who else will mount operas in the Philippines with great care, vision, and respect for the traditions of the art form?
Instead, he said, “She is a great loss to her family first and foremost, to all the people whom she worked with and have earned great respect, a great loss to the people that loves her. She sets the bar at a very high level with her leadership, her personal touch to what she does. I can tell that she brings with her great passion to whatever she does. It takes great courage and conviction to do what she does.”
To Nedy, the tenor said: “Thank you for being the mother to most of us musicians.”
Tantoco was not stranger to the arts before she met the stars of opera and music.
She confided to a lifestyle editor once: “As a romantic teenager, I remember really enjoying the ballet Romeo and Juliet at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. My father (Ambassador Bienvenido Tantoco) would buy seasonal tickets so we would be assured of chances to see the best shows.”
At the height of the pandemic, Tantoco spearheaded an online recital for Cecile Licad for the benefit of the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra Society, Inc.
The setting was the historic Lotos Club of New York, one of the oldest literary clubs in the US, founded on March 15, 1870 by a group of young writers, among them Mark Twain, who was an early member in 1873.
“I’ve never figured in an online recital,” recalled Licad. “But when it is Nedy (Tantoco) suggesting, I know that it will produce good results and the feedback from online audiences confirmed that.”
The last time Tantoco talked to Licad, it was to tell her that Maestro Grzegorz Nowak has said yes to a Women’s Month PPO concert at the Met in March. “Nedy works fast every time she has a music project. I’ve seen that for many years I worked with her,” added Licad.
The arts partnership between Tantoco and Floirendo go a long way.
“Nedy has a deep passion for the arts especially music. No wonder she became a prominent figure in the Philippine opera scene even before my term as CCP interim president. Turandot was the last opera mounted at the CCP before it closed for a three-year renovation,” Floirendo said.
The former CCP interim president said Tantoco raised funds to assist retiring orchestra musicians and to buy new musical instruments for the CCP orchestra.
“As I now step into her shoes on an interim basis, the board is gearing up for its annual fundraiser on November 29, 2024 at the Samsung Theater in Makati Circuit. Nedy’s legacy of supporting the arts will undoubtedly continue to inspire us as we carry on her work,” she added.
One of this year’s Gawad CCP awardees, Tantoco was chair and CEO of Rustan’s Commercial Corporation since 2008.
The Cecile Licad-PPO concert at the Met in March this year was her idea.
It was an emotional moment for son Anton Tantoco Huang when Licad dedicated Schumann’s Widmung (Dedication) to her mom as one of the encore numbers in Huang said: “Of course I feel sad that it was actually my mom’s last concert. But in her memory, I will continue to support whatever Mom has started.”
Tantoco told this writer before her untimely demise: “You know what Pablo. My dream is to see a partnership between two great artists with Filipino roots. Tarmo Peltokoski and Cecile Licad with the PPO.”
