MUSICAL TRIBUTE TO JOVY SALONGA PROPOSED
When Salonga died on 10 March 2016, Tony and Olivier Award-winning singer Lea Salonga eulogized: ‘RIP, Senator Jovito Salonga. They sure don’t make them like you anymore.’
Social idealism and music are among the passions of the late outstanding Senate President Jovito “Jovy” R. Salonga, whose 100th birth anniversary on 22 June 2020 was quietly marked at his former hot spring pools rest house in Pansol, Laguna — now W Resort. Temporarily closed last year due to the quarantine, W Resort is now open for vacationers, team-building and events.
Its owner, writer, realty entrepreneur and Kamuning Bakery Café head Wilson Lee Flores, said that once the pandemic is over, he plans to host a musical tribute for Salonga with a reunion of his favorite singers who used to perform there, like Andion Fernandez, Celeste Legaspi, Homer Son, Frankie Aseniero, the UP Singing Ambassadors, among others. One of Salonga’s favorite singers was the late Nolyn Cabahug. His guests at the Pansol resthouse included three former Presidents — Cory Aquino, Fidel Ramos and Joseph Estrada, as well as of other leaders, foreign diplomats and intellectuals.
This proposed music tribute to Salonga shall be similar to the 7 March 2020 Pandesal Forum hosted by Kamuning Bakery Café in Quezon City just before the lockdown, in honor of poet, veteran journalist and screenwriter Jose “Pete” Lacaba, called “Kape’t Ka Pete Music & Poetry Night.”
When Salonga died on 10 March 2016, Tony and Olivier Award-winning singer Lea Salonga eulogized: “RIP, Senator Jovito Salonga. They sure don’t make them like you anymore.”
On his 100th birth anniversary last year, Coney Reyes’ son, Pasig City Mayor Vico Sotto, visited his tomb and said: “I paid my respects to former Senate President Jovito Salonga, one of the greatest statesmen to have ever come out of Pasig.”
It was on 22 July 2013, coincidentally the 442nd anniversary of the founding of Laguna province by Spanish colonizers, that Flores purchased the hotspring pool resthouse in Pansol, Laguna which Salonga and wife Lydia built in 1974.
Now named W Resort, it is located at Champaca Street corner Narra Street corner Sampaguita Street, Miramonte Village, Brgy. Pansol, Calamba City, Laguna. W Resort has two high-ceilinged bungalows with airconditioned bedrooms, social and dining areas, gardens, two pianos, a hotspring swimming pool, kiddie pool, two kitchens, videoke, BBQ grille and billiards. After the pandemic, lores plans to host some of Kamuning Bakery Café’s tertulia-inspired Pandesal Forum sessions with leaders and media, as well as music and literary events.