By Myrna Peña-Reyes
It was nostalgia night for us at the Campus Choristers Grand Reunion Concert at the Luce Auditorium last Aug. 24, 2023.
Already “Canaan-nites” (cane users), my twin sister and I sat in the audience thoroughly enjoying the performance of the Choristers under the direction of Dr. Susan Vista-Suarez. Her group of singers follows some 60-plus years after ours in the mid-1950s when we were in college, and had Priscilla “Precy” Magdamo-Abraham as our director, one of the original founders of the Campus Choristers.
My sister and I discovered our joy of singing in a group when we were still in elementary school at Silliman. Already possessing unusually low voices for Filipinas, we always sang second voice or alto. (When we spoke in class, our low voice elicited embarrassing comments from some classmates: Ay, morag lalaki!, and until now, we are called “sir” on the phone.)
Our Junior Church Choir sang on Sundays at the Junior Church service in the Scheide Chapel behind the present Katipunan Hall. (When I saw for the first time a sheet music for choral singing, I was relieved when I could figure out how to follow the alto line.)
When Silliman celebrated its 50th Golden jubilee in 1952, our Junior Choir sang a small part in Schubert’s The Omnipotence that the combined choirs at Silliman performed under the direction of Mrs. Mercedes Magdamo (mother of Priscilla).
Moving up to high school, we became members of the High School Church Choir directed by Precy Magdamo. Rehearsals were at unholy hours—after lunch early afternoon once a week, and 7:00 on Sunday mornings before high school church service began.
But we learned discipline and commitment under Precy whom we admired and respected. (She was the director of the premier choral group on campus, the Campus Choristers, that we secretly hoped to become members of when we would be in college.)
We were dedicated choir members with our close friends since elementary school: Ligaya Magbanua, Florence Dimaya, Myrna Ghent, Carmen Estacion; Tressa Mahy and Amelita Dolorico joined us in high school.
Not content with church choir, we formed The Larks, our girls a capella singing group that sang secular songs at school events. Elmer’s Tune, Ay Yi Yi Yi Yi (I Like You Very Much), Sentimental Journey, September Song were our favorites.
Once, Precy heard The Larks rehearsing. Thereafter, she would share other music for us to sing in public. She gave us the Gay Gavotte to sing for our part in the Mozart Festival which Prof. Albert Faurot had organized, held in the all-purpose Gymnasium.
The different choirs and singing groups of Silliman, plus a small orchestra performed the finale, which Professor Faurot, stepping out of his pianist persona, conducted himself, with interesting results.
Another time, Precy gave us This is My Country, a song celebrating love and loyalty to country to represent SU at a patriotic event of Dumaguete at Quezon Park. (We changed the word “America” to “Philippines” in the song.)
Close to our high school graduation, Precy unexpectedly asked my sister and me to join the Campus Choristers. We couldn’t believe it! The Campus Choristers were preparing to give a concert in Cebu, and Precy must have wanted to strengthen the alto and soprano sections.
Aside from us, she had asked Tressa Mahy also, a soprano. So we became Campus Choristers before we entered college.
For myself, I felt anxious, unsure whether I was good enough to be in the group. I was intimidated in the company of real talent like Nenen Layague, Elmo Makil, Emmanuel “Boy” Gregorio, and others with outstanding voices.
Representing different courses of study, the Chorister members were majoring in Music, Pre-Med, Chemistry, English, Sociology, P.E., Home Economics, Law, Theology. What we had in common was a sheer love of singing, and a commitment to spend time working on sounding good together.
Sometimes Precy would invite American foreign students, Junior Year Abroaders (JYA), to join the Choristers; her rationale, perhaps: to give the student JYAs the experience since singing in a chorus is a Silliman tradition.
It didn’t take long for me to feel comfortable in the group. We were often joking, bantering, guffawing, fooling with the pronunciation of words in a song (e.g. in Lavender Blue dili dili, we would pronounce the latter like the Cebuano word for “no”).
Precy and Ruth Imperial, our accompanist, would join in, but had a way of signaling when it was time to get down to work. We enjoyed singing together, welcoming new pieces to learn, becoming passable sight-readers in time.
Our repertoire had songs popularized by Fred Waring and His Pennsylvanians: June is Bustin’ Out All Over, It’s a Grand Night for Singing, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, You’ll Never Walk Alone, All the Things You Are, Battle Hymn of the Republic, spirituals, etc.)
Other than concerts, we also sang at receptions for VIP guests at President Calderon’s home on campus.
Sometimes at night after rehearsals, we would sit in the ball field (before the Luce Auditorium and Library complex were built), talking, eating, laughing, sometimes singing together softly. But some faculty-staff whose homes were near the ball field complained that we interrupted their sleep, and had the Administration put a stop to our innocent pleasure.
One night, after violinist Gil Lopez-Kabayao had given a concert in the Gym, we decided to serenade him after learning he would be sleeping at one of the homes near the ball field. We were wary but undaunted. Gathering at the foot of the stairs leading to the front door, we sang In the Still of the Night. We had hardly finished the song when the front door opened, and there stood Gil Lopez-Kabayao in his robe. From the shadows, he thanked us, and praised our singing enthusiastically. He went on and on about how good we sounded. Highly pleased, we couldn’t help wondering how his hosts for that night might have thought of us then.
It wasn’t just with the Campus Choristers that we sang in college. We were also in the Covenant Choir that sang for the college Sunday church service.
Mr. William Pfeiffer was our formidable choir director. Singing under his strict guidance made me the serious discriminating listener today. He also directed us in an operetta, The Emperor’s New Clothes, teaching the chorus how to move while singing on stage, how to overcome our self-consciousness as actors. Singing while standing in place is what we had been doing all along.
When Precy Magdamo embarked on her folk song project, she spent less time with the Campus Choristers. I don’t remember who took over, maybe Bobbie Dimaya-Vista?
Precy organized a smaller choral group, The Folk Arts Ensemble, personally choosing its singers from the Campus Choristers, four singers for each voice section.
Once again, my sister and I were among the chosen. My memories of touring with the group are the highlights of my life in college. But that’s another story.
The 1950s-1960s was the Golden Age of Choral Music at Silliman. We are seeing a resurgence of it at this time, and are most grateful. They bring back cherished memories:
After evening rehearsals of the Campus Choristers, we sometimes strolled over to the boulevard, especially when the moon was out, singing our unofficial team song, If I Loved You. Munching on peanuts and fruits in season, we would talk, joke, and laugh boisterously, while the moon sailed forever going nowhere on the water to the soothing sway of waves breaking gently on the sand.
Our Dumaguete of yesterday.
