UP Arco string ensemble Europe-bound

UP ARCO has been invited to participate at the Budapest Music Festival in Hungary and to compete at the International Youth Music Festival I in Slovakia in July.

The University of the Philippines Arco string ensemble has always placed a great deal of importance on playing original Filipino orchestral pieces. And the group will make it a point to showcase some of those compositions when it takes the stage at two international music festivals in Europe next month.

“We always make sure to include local works in our repertoire, especially when we get the chance to perform abroad. This is our way of introducing our music to the world,” said Edna Marcil Martinez, the director and conductor of UP Arco, which has been invited to participate at the Budapest Music Festival in Hungary (July 2 to 6); and compete at the International Youth Music Festival I in Bratislava, Slovakia (July 9 to 12).

Among the Filipino compositions UP Arco intends to perform are Francisco Buencamino’s “Pizzicato Caprice,” Antonio Buenaventura’s Rondino from “Children’s Quartet” and Felipe de Leon’s “Payapang Daigdig.”

“I’ve always believed that our music can hold its own against what the other countries have to offer,” Martinez told the Inquirer at a recent press conference hosted by the Slovakia Honorary Consul General to the Philippines Robert Siy Chin, at the Kamuning Bakery Café in Quezon City.

Martinez, who teaches full-time at the Strings and Chamber Music Department of UP College of Music, said that it’s the first time the country will be represented in the youth orchestra categories of both events. The ensemble’s last high-profile international outing was in 2012 at the Festival international musique universitaire in Belfort, France.

“They may have already seen our choirs but I don’t think they know that we actually have youth orchestras,” she said. “This opportunity is important to us because we hope to put the Philippines on the map of orchestral music.”

Rehearsals

Composed of 19 students aged 18 to 25, UP Arco—which also functions as the strings section of the UP Orchestra—has been neck-deep in rehearsals for the past few weeks. Winning in Bratislava wasn’t the goal at first said Martinez. But after seeing the members work so hard, she said that bringing home the prize would be a nice bonus.

“We’ll compete and give the other contestants a good fight. I want the kids to give more than a hundred percent,” she said. “But if we lose, we’ll do so with heads held high.”

After the engagements in Budapest and Bratislava, UP Arco will travel to Milan and Genoa in Italy to hold concerts for the Filipino communities there.