Jose Estella - "Ang Maya" for voice and piano (BUWAN NG WIKA FINALE)

José A. Estrella (or Estella) (1870-1943) was a Spanish insular, a creollo, a Filipino composer who was not a mere gig musician who composed waltzes but an important public intellectual who filipinized Spanish zarzuelas from 1890s to 1900s and a nationalist artist who asserted the beauty of Philippine folk songs and dances in his large works such as Cancionero Filipino, Filipinas Symphony (1928), the first symphony written by a Filipino, Ultimo Adios (symphonic ode), and the opera Lakambini (Maiden). The scope of preserved music manuscripts and prints in the Estella collection is unique for it chronicles a wide time period (late 1880s to 1938), the cultural history of which is yet to be written. Practically all of José Estella’s music creations - arrangements, transcriptions, and original compositions based on Cebuano balitaw, Hiligaynon Lulay, Tagalog auit and condiman, Waray Curacha – are intact in this collection having been safeguarded from the many wars (1896 revolution, 1898 Filipino-American war, and 1945 Liberation of Manila from the Japanese) that were a prelude to the first Philippine Republic in 1946. His “El Diablo Mundo,” which premiered on October 25, 1893, was the first zarzuela ever performed at the famed Zorilla Theater. He wrote two operas, “Veni, Vidi, Vici” and “Lakambini,” and six more zarzuelas, namely, “Ing Dalaga,” Ing Loro ning Gobernadora,” Ligaya, 1904,” “Sangla ni Rita,” “Ang Opera Italiana,” and “La Venta de Filipinas al Japon.” The waltz “Ang Maya” ("The Sparrow") was a piece in Estella’s 1905 sarsuwela – with Severino Reyes as librettist – "Filipinas para los Filipinos", which critiqued the racist bill forbidding Filipino men to marry American women, a double-standard in colonial policy. “Maya” is rice bird, a typical object in Philippine landscape. Estella consciously represented the everyday life of common people in the Philippines, thus predating some works by composers who graduated from UP Conservatory of Music in 1920s. Severino’s youngest son, Pedrito, said that the song was inspired by the maya chirping in the trees near his father’s summer hut. This song is popular with sopranos of high range. Maria Carpena, known as the first Filipino recording artist and sarswela star, recorded this popular song for Victor Records in 1913. She did the recording with the Molina Orchestra, at a makeshift studio in the Manila Hotel. "Ang Maya" also became the signature song of soprano Consuelo Salazar-Perez, who starred in a movie of the same title in 1938. In 1992, the song was included in a modern sarswela by Nicanor Tiongson called "Pilipinas Circa 1907", which was presented by Tanghalang Pilipino at the Cultural Center of the Philippines. (jphilmusic.wordpress.com, himig.com.ph) Please take note that the audio AND the sheet music ARE NOT mine. Change the quality to a minimum of 480p if the video is blurry. Original audio:    • Ang Maya Jose Estella   (Performance by: Rachel Larsen (soprano), Osvaldo de Leon Davila (piano)) Original sheet music: https://drive.google.com/drive/folder...