A DINNER concert featuring two young talents with Baguio roots is set to keep classical music alive in one of the city’s heritage properties along Upper Session Road on June 5.
The concert called the “Acoustic Adagietto” is part of the 2016 Baguio Summer Music Festival series, which started with the Summer Out There Baguio Edition music camp, followed by the visit of the Manila Symphony Junior Orchestra.
The series of concerts are being conducted at the Hill Station within Casa Vallejo, said event coordinator Babeth Lolarga.
Featured talents with Baguio roots are soprano Stefanie Quintin and guitarist Anton Luis Avila. Their program covers classical arias by Scarlatti, Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti and authentic Brazilian bossa and bachianas by Jorge Morel, Jayme Ovalle, Laurindo Almeida and Heitor Villa-Lobos.
Quintin will also be singing a rarely heard Pangasinense lullabye. She graduated with a degree in vocal pedagogy and vocal performance from the University of the Philippines College of Music under the tutelage of Professor Fides Cuyugan-Asensio and Rica Nepomuceno.
Quintin has performed in international music festivals in Asia and Europe. Her opera credits include Cimarosa’s Il Matrimonio Segreto, Mozart’s Die Zauberflote, Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore, Bellini’s La Sonnambula and Menotti’s A Hand of Bridge. She currently works and performs with German classical guitarist Carsten Linck. She is a member of Ripieno Ensemble, a group of musicians dedicated to promoting and performing new music in the Philippines.
Avila is also pursuing his music degree from the UP College of Music under Professor Lester Demetillo.
In 2005, he competed in the National Music Competition for Young Artists, bagging the local and regional titles and performing for the final round of the competition. He took up guitar master classes with Rupert Boyd, Judicael Perroy, Zeah Riordan at the Third Asian Suzuki Conference and faced a panel composed of Filipino guitarists Jose Valdez, Demetillo and Michael Dadap in the First Philippine International Guitar Festival.
Avila is active in chamber music as a player and as an accompanist to singers, choirs and other chamber musicians. He is a recipient of the Loyola Schools Award for the Arts conferred by the Ateneo de Manila University School of Humanities. He has a degree in applied mathematics majoring in mathematical finance from the Ateneo.
The Baguio Summer Music Festival and “Acoustic Adagietto” are made possible by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts. Tickets are available at the Hill Station. (JMP)