After 14 Years...

…I’m in school again… music school. Wednesday I had my first piano lesson at Abelardo Hall or the UP College of Music. The last time I had guided instruction for the piano was in 1991—sa UP din, with Ate Betty Arcilla. Was only 17 at the time, 3rd year high school and I remember totally hating going to UP for my piano lessons because it was in the summer and UP was something like 2 hours away from my house at the Republic of Far Away Paranaque! Kakatamad talaga nun... summer vacation pa! Who wouldn't want to go to the beach and not need to “work” on scales and arpeggios ano? Nonetheless, dahil super patient si Ate Betty na teacher ko nun at super insistent si Daddy, I finished my 1991 piano schoolyear with Grade IV credentials, I think.

I left piano school in 1992. But I don’t think piano-playing ever left me. Like somebody "called" to a mission, I was inevitably drawn to the piano. Come college, ako na mismo nagprisintang ituloy ang pagpa-piano ko, pero mostly on my own na. Thank God He called me to play for the Cruzada Church Choir and that the demands of Tito Poly on the pieces I was to accompany were challenging: san ka ba naman nakakita ng Grade IV pianist na binabanatan ang Hallelujah Chorus?

My program this sem runs 14 weeks and I’m excited about it. I really, really, really hope I improve enough to join the recital in September! Malay natin, magtuloy-tuloy na ako dito… you never know. I might still be a UP teacher, but not in the College of Business anymore, but somewhere else in the university… in a college less technical and more musical?... Baket ba?!!! Libre naman mangarap ah!


my own humble "concert hall"...in the living room of our house with my cats as audience


Abelardo Hall at UPCMusic... wish ko talaga makapagrecital na ulit


UPCollege of Music... around 10 minutes walk from my College