Concluding over 50 years of music
World-renowned concert pianist Ingrid Sala-Santamaria will bid farewell to her career as a classical musician in a concert dubbed Ingrid: Grand Finale on Feb. 25 at the Pacific Grand Ballroom of the Waterfront Cebu City Hotel and Casino.
The concert is organized by alumni of the Sala-Santamaria Foundation, which has sponsored scholarships for children with great potential as musicians. Having realized their own dreams of perpetuating music in Cebu and all over the world, the former students of Dr. Santamaria reunited to pay tribute to their inspiration. The event dubbed as Santamaria's retirement concert is mostly a reunion of musicians who were under the care of the Salvador and Pilar Sala Foundation.
“We're having this concert and a lot of people have had different reactions with the title and a lot of them ask me why ‘Grand Finale?' Because some of them, they always feel that Madam Ingrid has not aged. But just like Manny Pacquiao, he already retired (April 2016) but then he fought again,” said Hazel Magdadaro-Sanchez, one of the producers of the upcoming concert and alumni of the Salvador and Pilar Sala Foundation.
“Phil Collins also had a retirement concert but then a year after, he went on another tour. So just because this is called a finale, it doesn't mean that this will be the last. This would just be a sort of official conclusion but she is not saying that she will not perform again.”
Santamaria is turning 77 on Feb. 25.
“I believe she has already accomplished much in the field of music and she did not only accomplish it for her own good. She shared her talent with the hundreds of scholars produced by the foundation. The music schools that have been popping up, majority of them are by our colleagues. And the different choir groups in churches and orchestras that you hear are being headed, led and trained by our colleagues. So the music industry in Cebu wouldn't be what it is today had they not ventured into that 10-year project to train young musicians in Cebu. So this is our way of showing gratitude. Our family is always grateful for Madam Ingrid and her family,” continued Magdadaro-Sanchez.
Magdadaro-Sanchez and her sister Hannah Go, with the support of their parents Greg and Lou Magdadaro, will be producing the upcoming concert. They will also be playing in the orchestra for Santamaria. They are among the first batch of graduates from the foundation.
Because there was a strong reaction from fans on the notion that it will be her last concert, Santamaria clarified that she will have two more finale concerts in Manila to officially conclude the hundreds of concerts that she has been having all over the world in the past years.
“The bottom line of this is that Cebu is assured of a classic music tradition because of our 25-yearold program. The Sala Foundation started in 1991. We had a dream, a mission and a vision. We wanted to give Cebu something to be remembered by, and together with the foundation, we thought an orchestra would be such a vehicle,” Santamaria said.
“I can see the alumni that have established schools and orchestra groups. They are all the fruit and the flower of the seeds that we planted. So we are very grateful. In the last 15 years, together with my mentor and professor Reynaldo Reyes, we went all over the country giving piano concerts. We gave over 500 concerts in 15 years starting in 2000 after we launched the orchestra. Now, I am in the process of doing my so called ‘life-ending activities.”
“So I had made some CDs with the orchestra in Cebu. I have made six concertos with the orchestra. I have already completed four coffee table books. I have finished the first one that I called Four Seasons, which we launched two years ago. And then I did the second one, which is about the concerts that Prof. Reyes and I did all over the country. Now the third and fourth books are now finally in front of me. The third one is about the 10-year development program of the Cebu Youth Symphony Orchestra, and the fourth book is the ensuing last 15 years which detail the paths that our young ones have taken.
“The last pages of the second book feature half a page each of 105 selected scholars. So these books, I consider them as a memorial not just to ourselves as the institution that sponsored the training program, but really more to the products of the program,” said Santamaria.
The concert will be conducted by Rodel A. Flores and features the Cebu Youth Symphony Orchestra and the Peace Philharmonic Philippines. On Feb. 25 at 3 p.m. is the matinee, which is also a Music Education Hour for students who are eager to learn classical music from Santamaria. Tickets are priced at P100. The gala concert will be at 7 p.m. with tickets priced from P500 to P1,500.