Musica FEUROPA 2011 Grand Finals

1st Place Open Category UPLB Chorale Ensemble

Congratulations to the Musica FEUROPA 2011 winners!

High School Category

1^st Place Boscorale

2^nd Place Ramon Magsaysay High School

3^rd Place UPLB Rural High School Choir

Open Category

1^st Place UPLB Chorale Ensemble

2^nd Place The La Salle Chorale

3^rd Place San Antonio de Padua Chamber Choir

Musica FEUROPA, the Far Eastern University-European Union Chorale Competition in the Philippines has indeed gotten bigger and better in its third year of staging this competition.  The semi final round was held on the first day of the competition but I wasn't able to watch it. So I made sure to be present at the grand finals held at the FEU Auditorium the following day. There was a good audience turnout as I got into my seat and there was indeed excitement, anxiety and nervousness inside the auditorium which is what I normally expect whenever there is a competition.

I was able to watch all the choirs perform but I had to leave moments before the winners were announced. And as I was about to leave, I saw a conductor of one of the choirs and congratulated him. He was a bit amused as to why I was already congratulating him since the winners haven’t been announced yet. It was a fearless forecast for me but I was pretty sure that they nailed it. And I was right, it was Vonn Lomarda of the UPLB Chorale Ensemble whom I congratulated and they indeed won first place in the Open Category. They were spectacular last year and this year they raised the standard with their impeccable and very solid choral technique. And I was very pleased by how the two songs they selected were not similar to each other which really showcased their range and diversity. And I really liked the first song that they performed which started with very low bass and haunting chants. The opening was made up of unison parts that showcased the choir's excellent phrasing. And then came the multiple layers of different parts until the resounding climax. And after this was a recapitulation of the haunting chants and I knew right then and there that this was the choir to beat.

In the High School Category, the Boscorale was the standouts and the crowd favorite as well since it was the only all boys choir in the competition. One might think that the lack of female voices would mean a thin sounding choir but that wasn't the case with this group. They were by far the most entertaining and exciting choir to watch in all of the competition. And I guess that it didn't hurt for them to be wearing bow ties with their suits which added some swagger to their performance.

2nd Place Open Category The La Salle Chorale

I noticed that a few of the songs this year were already performed by other choirs last year and I couldn’t help but make a comparison which choir performed them better. More interesting was that there weren’t any song duplicates this year unlike last year when three choirs had the same song. So there was great variety in the songs coming from all the choirs this year.

All the choirs were required to perform two pieces. One had to be a song that was written by a composer whose nationality is rooted in any European Union country. And the other had to be a song written by a Filipino composer and this had no limitations regarding the genre and the language/dialect used. I noted that a lot of the choirs were remarkably weaker with their EU song and their overall performance felt uneven since they were strong with the Filipino song. I guess it’s because they don’t probably have the EU piece in their normal repertoire and only had to learn one for the sake of the competition.

These were just my thoughts and I have no idea if those who judged the competition also thought of these as well. These adjucators by the way were Rodolfo Delarmente, Edgardo Manguiat, Rafael Serrallet, Arwin Tan and Jonathan Velasco.

3rd Place Open Category San Antonio de Padua Chamber Choir

I’ve already seen two stagings of this competition and it seems that next year will continue the growth of this event. This year saw the competition spread into two days and the inclusion of the High School Category. It will be interesting to see how this Musica FEUROPA will continue to grow on its 4th year. All we know so far is that this year’s winners go straight to the finals next year. So the countdown to the 4th Musica FEUROPA now begins.