Thursday, December 26, 2013

Akapela Open Finals Night

Acapellago
JC Arizapa, Ron Laderas, Avin Laderas, Daniel Briones, and Trishia Marie Ilingan

Contemporary a cappella singing made its presence felt in the Philippines this 2013 through a series of workshops conducted by Ryan Cayabyab. And the workshops eventually lead towards the first ever Akapela Open where a total of nine a cappella groups from all over the country battled it out at the Meralco Theater with Acapellago from Malolos, Bulacan emerging triumphant.

Acapellago, composed of Trishia Marie Ilingan, Daniel Briones, Avin Laderas JC Arizapa and Ron Laderas, mesmerized the crowd with their Jeepney themed medley that included Jeepney both by Kala and Sponge Cola, Jeepney Love Story by Yeng Constantino and tucked in the middle of it all was Ryan Cayabyab’s Limang Dipang Tao. The crowd pleasing number was not only linked thematically, but it also had a story behind it which is that of a budding love among passengers inside a jeepney. Acapellago had the audience by the palm of their hands that by the time they did their second number Yakap Sa Dilim, they practically sealed their win in my opinion. As the first ever winner of the Akapela Open, the group received P250,000 and a trophy.

The 1st Runner Up and recipient of P150,000 was the Baguio based group Pinopella. They had a jam packed presentation that started with the up tempo Wings by Little Mix.  Their second song was Sa May Bintana, composed by Ryan Cayabyab and originally recorded by James Coronel. They capped it off with a medley of contemporary pop tunes that included Call Me Maybe, Domino, Roar, Payphone, Just the Way You Are and We are Young.

UP Diliman based group 1415 was the 2nd Runner Up winning P100,000.  Their rendition of the Eraserhead’s Alapaap also won them the Best Arrangement of an OPM song which was worth an additional P50,000. For their second number, they did a mashup of Antukin and Elesi.

Acapellago performing at the after party

The other competing teams in the competition were D’Trendz from Digos City, Davao, Fivibe also from Davao, Overtone who are based in UST, Tafttonic from De La Salle University, the Xavier University Glee Club Showstoppers and W/Plesha. The non-winning groups got a surprise as they were all awarded a consolation prize of P30,000 by One Meralco Foundation and Meralco Chief Operating Officer Oscar Reyes.

The judging panel given the difficult task of adjudicating the groups was made up of choral conductor Jonathan Velasco, Baihana member Krina Cayabyab, and singer/musician Monet Silvestre. The trio of Banjo Gonzales, Pael Gutierrez and Enzo Mendoza proved to be capable hosts for finals night. Their onstage antics and impromptu a cappella singing based on a single word solicited from the audience brought some hearty laughs from the audience.

The Akapela Open really marked the resurgence of contemporary a cappella singing here in the country. I am pleased that competing groups were only allowed to do original arrangements for the finals night. And the addition of a prize for Best Arrangement of an OPM Song encouraged all the teams to include a Filipino song in their numbers. But I noticed that some of the groups’ performances of the Filipino songs were not up to par compared to the foreign ones. I guess that the local tunes had not been part of their repertoire and that they only learned the pieces just for the competition. I expect that this discrepancy between the local and foreign tunes will be lessened in upcoming editions of the competition. The bar has already been set and I can expect that many a cappella groups now are already looking forward to the next edition of the Akapela Open. The future also looks bright for contemporary a cappella singing here in the Philippines since one off shoot of the competition was the formation of Philippine Contemporary A cappella Society.

Acapellago with Ryan Cayabyab

The Akapela Open was presented by The Music School of Ryan Cayabyab with the PLDT Smart Foundation and One Meralco Foundation.

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