How Rock N’ Roll Roused Up Angeles City from the Ashes

Sunday, October 23, 2011

BEFORE Mt. Pinatubo erupted on June 12, 1991, Angeles City has always been known for its life after dark, no thanks to the American GIs who were on “R&R” during the Vietnam War and on to the succeeding years, when Clark was still an American military base.

But Pinatubo spoiled the fun, burying the city and much of Central Luzon in tons of ash and lahar. Experts said it was the biggest volcanic eruption in modern history. Pinatubo also shooed away the Americans, who were anyway at that time besieged by a growing clamor that they leave Clark.

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On September 1991, the Philippine Senate, in a historic move, voted down the extension of the US-RP Military Bases Agreement, effectively terminating the tenancy of the US in all its military bases in the country, including Clark and Subic.

More than a year into the Pinatubo eruption on October 1992, Angeles City was still a devastated city, with many of its rich citizens leaving and disposing their homes at basement prices. October was the fiesta month for Angeles, but gloom still enveloped the city.

Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan, an occasional rock n’ roller, was in a bind as well. How to get the city back on its feet, after the “double whammy” caused by the volcano and the sudden vacuum left by the Americans (even if Pamintuan was an anti-base activist himself), was a challenge he had to face.

The idea hit him like a rock on the head. He blurted out to his friends later: “Let’s rock n’ roll!”

And the Tigtigan, terakan keng dalan (singing and dancing in the streets) was born.

The idea was to bring back the very element that characterized Angeles City: fun. Pamintuan, together with his chief of staff and comrade in the anti-bases movement Alex Cauguiran, persuaded the owners of business establishments that were affected by the volcano, mainly restaurants and bars, to open up shop, and bring out their tables and chairs along MacArthur Highway for an all-night singing and dancing to literally rouse up the city and get its citizens to go out and conquer the gloom with rock n’ roll.

He also talked to his band and other musicians of the city to put up their acts again in several points of MacArthur Highway.

The first Tigtigan, Terakan keng Dalan was held on October 30, 1992. Just as Pamintuan predicted, Angeleños came in droves. The city, for that night, lit up again, and the people began swaying with life to the beat of rock n’ roll.

Pamintuan may have picked up the idea from the traditional Octoberfest of Germany, actually a beer drinking spree, a local version of which has been put up yearly by a local beer company, and from the mardi gras festivals in Rio de Janeiro and New Orleans. If these festivals work, why not a local version?

Tigtigan became a regular event that was highly anticipated and participated in by tens of thousands of people during the two terms Pamintuan was mayor, to the three terms of then mayor and now Congressman Tarzan Lazatin and one term of Pamintuan’s political nemesis Blue Boy Nepomuceno, albeit using a different term to describe the event.

Tigtigan has also become part of the national tourism calendar.

The success of the event can be summed up by what a San Miguel Corporation executive said. According to him, San Miguel, a regular sponsor since, has never sold so much beer anywhere in just a single event.

The Tigtigan has since evolved from just a night of music and dancing. Other cultural events have been introduced since last year, which marked the comeback of Pamintuan as mayor. Because of its success, and to accommodate the other cultural and fashion-related events, the festival has been held for two consecutive days, the last Friday and Saturday of October, capping the month-long Fiestang Kuliat.

On October 28 to 29, Angeles City will rock again. As in the common belief of ancient tribes that loud music and the sound of drums and gong drive the bad spirits away, it seems that rock n’ roll did drive the spirit of gloom from the city. In more ways than one, Angeles City has risen from the ashes and thrived in ways much better that when Pinatubo was an unnoticed menace and when the GIs were lords.