Archive - Arts & Culture

  By JOSEPH CORTES AN epic tells the aspirations of a people: where they come from, what they are, and what they hope to be. At times of hardship and despair, retelling the people’s glorious past in the form of an epic, and not its history, serves to rally the masses to gather together and

By DESIREE CALUZA DEDICATED to the proposition that “Love is beyond gender and sexual orientation,” a church in Baguio City makes possible same-sex love to bloom and have it formalized in a marriage ceremony. Last Dec. 23, Myke Sotero, 44, exchanged “I do’s” with his long-time partner Gregory Rugay,40, in a solemn ceremony conducted by

    By JOSEPH CORTES CONSIDER yourself lucky if you were one of those who enjoyed The Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra’s 40th anniversary concert last month because it may take some time before you will have the opportunity to listen to Ryan Cayabyab’s violin concerto that premiered that night. It has something to do with the

Text, photos and video by VINCENT GO THE sound of firecrackers filled the narrow streets of Binondo as crowds packed the district to watch traditional lion and dragon dancers welcome the Lunar New Year. Binondo, as Manila’s Chinatown is known, joined the world’s Chinese community in greeting the Lunar New Year with fireworks, feng shui,

Text and photos by ELIZABETH LOLARGA COLUMNIST-HUMORIST Chit Roces-Santos has joined the respected ranks of hyphenated women authors at the launch of her first book, Personal Space and Other Essays. At the well-attended event at Powerbooks in Greenbelt Makati, the author marked other milestones: another birthday in her senior citizen’s life, coming out with her

  By PABLO A. TARIMAN  THE most encouraging thing about “Daragang Magayon: An Istorya Ni Mayon” is that it was spearheaded by the provincial government of Albay as part of its tourism pitch. Very few in the government sector believe in the immense power of culture to perk up the tourism landscape. Albay, for one,

By WINNIE VELASQUEZ AS dragon and lion dancers usher in the Year of the Water Snake at around three in the afternoon Sunday, Feb 10, families and friends will gather to wish one another wealth, longevity, happiness and prosperity. And as cries of Gong Xi Fa Ca! rend the air, rituals steeped in centuries-old tradition

 Text and photos by ELIZABETH LOLARGA THE sixth of this month will linger long in the head and hearts, like the “last song syndrome,” of those who watched tenor Arthur Espiritu as he breathed life into the lyrics of poets and the music of the masters. The Ayala Museum lobby in Makati City was filled

  By NORMAN SISON Queen Sofia’s photo  by CASA DE S.M. EL REY / BORJA FOTÓGRAFOS IF you are a Filipino, most likely you can understand the Spanish headline above. Because of 300 years of Spanish colonial rule, Spanish is part of Filipino culture since Ferdinand Magellan discovered the Philippines in 1521. There are about

By NORMAN SISON Photos by ERIK C. LIONGOREN LATE last month, a Manila court sentenced activist Carlos Celdran to prison on charges of “offending religious feelings” for staging a theatrical protest in 2010 at the Manila Cathedral for the Roman Catholic Church’s opposition to a family planning bill that was then pending in Congress. International

By CHARMAINE DEOGRACIAS WHEN the Cultural Center of the Philippines launched master classes last year as part of their artist education program, it was honored by no less than world-class Filipino artist, Arthur Espiritu. Not only was it CCP’s first voice masterclass offer, it was also a rare first to have a tenor conduct a

By PABLO A. TARIMAN THE most followed teleserye on local television is no doubt ABS CBN’s “Ina, Kapatid, Anak” featuring Kim Chiu, Maya Salvador on one hand and Enchong Dee and Xian Lim, on the other. The big bonus is that the young stars have a power-house supporting cast in the person of Cherry Pie