Ian Veneracion
They are all of equal importance. They simply give different levels of satisfaction,” said Ian Veneracion about which from being an actor, a painter and a singer he considers closest to his heart.
“I cannot rank them because they happen in different stages of my life, and they are different passions. For example, there was a time I was so much into painting. Recently, it’s been music. There was also a season in my life when I did nothing but ride my motorbike, or go paragliding. They’re all of equal value because I am able to express myself in different ways through all of these interests,” said Ian during a media gathering to launch him as one of the members of A Team Philippines, a talent management and events group founded by singer-actor Ogie Alcasid.
“Currently, I feel that the best way for me to express myself is through music,” added Ian, whose single “Ninuno,” which he said A Team helped create, is now on Apple Music, Spotify and other platforms.
When Inquirer Entertainment asked him if the sound in “Ninuno” is the kind he wanted to be identified with as a musician, Ian replied: “I don’t want to put myself in a box. Just because ‘Ninuno’ is Pinoy rock, it doesn’t mean I’m not going to do anything jazzy, or ballad, or anything like that. I’d like to keep all those doors of different genres open.”
Tribute to Pinoy rock
He explained that the song is sort of a tribute to Pinoy rock. “I miss the sound of bands like Juan dela Cruz, although technology—the microphones, the studio equipment—was different at that time. With ‘Ninuno,’ I wanted to create something that sounded like it’s from that era. I wanted it raw. That’s why at the start of the song, you’d hear feedback from actual amp mixing. That was our inspiration,” Ian said.
“The song is trying to tell us to go on a journey to search for our roots. Personally, it’s reminding me of our ‘ninuno,’ of the fact that we come from a bloodline of warriors. This tells a lot about how we progressed, of whether or not we did progress as a nation. The song throws in a lot of questions, musically,” said Ian, who has been staging digital concerts since 2021; also sometimes with Ogie as the “Kilabotitos.”
Meanwhile, when asked what kind of fulfillment he gets from being a talent manager, Ogie replied: “I never imagined I’d become one, even in my dreams, but there’s a desire in me to help artists who have no managers fulfill their own dreams. This was why I made A Team, which stands for Alcasid Total Entertainment Artist Management.
Veneracion feels that the best way to express himself now is through his music.
Thrive and survive
“Even during the pandemic, we were still able to thrive and survive. Now that we have Ian by our side, it feels like, ‘Uy! We’re doing something good here.’ If there’s fulfillment in that, it’s that I feel good for having a great team behind me; with members who believe in me and in what we want to achieve,” Ogie explained.
“You see, we have a lot of amazing Filipino talents, but there are only a few who really want to help them. Of course, we can’t help everybody. To do this, there has to be a match between the company and the talent. We found a match in Ian,” declared Ogie.
Ian said it’s good that Ogie is also an artist other than a talent manager. “You are likely to share the same perspective and appreciate the same level of quality in the work you put out,” he explained.
“You may have great ideas, but there are a lot of limitations, too. You need tools, you need people, and you need to know all about costs in order to make your ideas happen. Having the support of A Team makes my job so much easier. I can concentrate on fulfilling my vision and let the team worry about whether what I want to do is feasible or not. I see so much potential in this kind of creative process,” Ian pointed out.
To this, Ogie reacted: “It’s good that he feels comfortable [with us]. This is why we thought of formalizing this thing that’s happening between us. Honestly, there was a point when we were waiting for the other to make the move. Nagliligawan pa. It was like, ‘Ano ba? Tayo na ba?’”
Business decision
“What happened was good,” Ian interjected. “It was a business decision not purely based on reason. It was like we simply went on with the flow.”
Ogie said the A Team’s plan for Ian’s show biz career “will depend on his mood.” He explained: “Ian is already a very accomplished actor, but he is just scratching the surface when it comes to music. We’re excited to see where this will take him. Like in Hollywood, for example, there are a lot of actors who go on tours with their bands, like Kevin Bacon and Robert Downey Jr. You just don’t know that they have gigs. Ian isn’t doing music as a fallback. He doesn’t need to. Artists like him want to be able to bare their heart and soul.”
Meanwhile, Ian recently finished taping an action series that’s intended to be streamed on Netflix. Lester Pimentel’s “A Love to Kill,” which also features Joel Torre and Andrea Torres,” was shot entirely in Iloilo. “The action scenes I did here were something else. Because of the new technology, your cameraman can now run behind you. Our fight coordinator is from Singapore and our stuntmen are really well-trained. It feels good to shoot action sequences today compared to when I was doing films in the ’90s. We now have the freedom to move because of upgrades in the cameras we are using. Hopefully, the series does well so we can start working on Season 2,” Ian said.
Other talents under A Team Philippines are Gian Magdangal, Lara Maige, Moira Lacambra, Aikee, Anthony Barion and Poppert Bernadas.