FACETS of highland culture will be seen in the 20th celebration of the Baguio Flower Festival.
Panagbenga Cultural Society chairman Carmencita Zuñiga said performers in the weekend parades will show off snippets of cultures from the mountains as seen in their costumes, accessories, dance steps and sound.
Zuñiga said the sound of the festival will be heard in the timeless opus of the late great Macario Fronda to be performed by the drum and lyre participating groups in the street dancing and float parades.
The Cultural Society, composed of five core members from the academe and the private sector, has ensured the passing on of cultures in the highlands with guidelines from the group to be strictly followed by participants.
There will be nine competing drum and lyre groups plus three guest performers, totaling a dozen musical renditions, for the crowd to appreciate.
There will be four competing high school street dancing groups vying for top spots and three contingents for the open category. A contingent is composed of 50 to 120 contingents.
There will be 10 judges from all over the country to judge the participants.
Last year, the Kabayan Youth Cultural Dance Troupe from Kamora National High School won the street dancing parade when they performed rituals depicting a bountiful harvest.
Zuñiga said costumes of each contingent, as well as their dance steps, were reviewed by the Cultural Society to ensure the smooth display of the tribe they represent.
Contingents will be depicting tribes from the provinces of Kalinga, Benguet and the Mountain Province, as well as Ilocos.
Zuñiga said the steps, the sound and the rituals presented in each contingent’s performance are authentic and reflect the Cordilleran way of life.
Zuñiga said the heart of the festival parades will still be Fronda’s piece which will be played. It depicts the terrain of the mountain city originally culled from the Bendian Dance of Benguet.
Fronda composed the hymn in 1989 to inspire Cordilleran athletes during the Palarong Pambansa inspired by the Ibaloi’s festive gongs combined with community chanting.
Fronda passed in 2013 but left the festival with a legacy of song which has become the official sound of the season of blossoming here.