|
CLASSICAL pianists Martha Brickman and Marguerite M.
Echaus are being very extra careful these days about
their health, especially their hands. While climbing
stairs or simply walking on a well-polished floor, they
must not slide or trip over something so as not to break
their fall with their hands. They shouldn’t wash the
dishes, do the laundry, take the garbage bag out and
other usual chores they do back home in Canada, where
they’ve been teaching for years at the Vancouver Academy
of Music.
After
all, they’re here in Metro Manila, where Echaus is
originally from. And being here, despite all the
widespread complaints on rising gas prices and all, it’s
still advisable and affordable to pay someone else to do
those chores, among other daily concerns, while you
focus on your craft or whatever is your line of work.
Of
course, Echaus and Brickman aren’t here because they’ve
gathered tons of laundry and dishes back home; neither
are they here on vacation. On July 19 at St. Cecilia’s
Hall, St. Scholastica’s College (SSC), they’re going to
perform for a benefit show, simply titled A Classic
Evening. They will be joined onstage by guest
pianists from SSC, like former teacher Priscilla de la
Fuente-Sison and current faculty member J. Greg Zuniega.
The beneficiaries are the Sr. Baptista Battig Music
Foundation Inc. and the Loyola School of Theology.
In
short, they are here to help some of our economically
challenged younger brothers and sisters study music and
theology. Their involvement in the cause is not a
glorious mystery. Echaus is an alumnus of SSC.
“The
idea to have this concert started almost a year ago,
with the centennial celebration of the founding of the
SSC. So it’s like a yearlong preparation. We can’t
afford to injure ourselves, even with a slight fever or
stomach problem,” Echauz told the BusinessMirror.
For a
backgrounder, Echaus got her first piano lessons at age
six under Sis. Imelda Halili, OSB, and Amanda Katigbak
at the SSC. But it was former dean Sis. Scholastica
Benitez, OSB, and Sis. Mary Placid Abejo, OSB, present
dean of SSC College of Music, who motivated her to
pursue a career in music.
When her
parents moved to the US because of martial law and
eventually settled in Canada, Echaus continued her
passion. She finished a bachelor of music in piano
performance (magna cum laude) from the Catholic
University of America in Washington, D.C.; a master of
music education from Holy Names College in Oakland,
California; and a professional teaching certificate from
the University of British California. She’s a
much-awarded musician and has been teaching piano at the
Vancouver Academy of Music for decades.
Among
her past shows-for-a-cause was Kayamanang Pilipino, a
project initiated by pop singer Joey Albert in Canada to
help Gawad Kalinga and the Multicultural Helping House
Society, a group helping new immigrants. It took place
in June 2007, and she performed duo piano works at the
Chan Center for the Performing Arts in Vancouver.
Echaus’s
favorite composer is Debussy, while Brickman is a
devotee of anything from the Baroque period.
Brickman
is Echaus’s cofaculty in the same school. She clarified
she has no relation to the famous pop musician Jim but
she also has a CD recording, titled Baroque Gems of the
18th Century. She was born in Montreal, studied and
mastered piano, oboe and the harpsichord (with Ferucio
Vignanelli in Rome). She’s been residing in Vancouver
since 1987 and has performed in almost all the esteemed
venues there.
It’s her
first time here and she’s very much amazed about the
surreal weather condition, especially when it’s like
40°C in the morning till afternoon and then it rains
till sundown. In Japan, raining while the sun shines
bright is a time when foxes marry, as shown in the film
Dreams by Akira Kurosawa. Here, the mythical explanation
is that there’s a python giving birth.
Brickman
and Echaus call it “some kind of an Indian summer” and
they’re being careful not to catch a cold.
On July
19 the program includes “Bato Sa Buhangin” by Ernani
Cuenco, “Minamahal Kita” by Mike Velarde Jr., “Slavonic
Dances” by Dvorak, “Suite No. 2 Opus 17” by Sergei
Rachmaninoff, “Jeux d’enfants Opus 22” by George Bizet,
“Scaramouche Suite for Two Pianos” by Darius Milhaud, “I
Got Rhythm Variations” by George Gershwin, “Jamaican
Rumba” by Arthur Benjamin, “El Vito from Danses
Andalouses” by Manuel Infante and “Malaguena from Suite
Andalucia” by Ernesto Lecuona, among others.
Rain or
shine, with Indians or foxes or pythons doing what
nature tells them to do, A Classic Evening is
surely not to be missed.
***Tickets are available at SSC Music Department
(526-8080) and the Loyola School of Theology, Ateneo de
Manila University (426-6431 to 35, local 3603). |
