Ryan Cayabyab (born Raymundo Cipriano Pujante

Cayabyab on May 4, 1954 in Manila, Philippines), also known

as Mr. C, is a Filipino musician, composer and conductor. He
was the Executive and Artistic Director for several years for the
defunct San Miguel Foundation for the Performing Arts. He
was named a National Artist of the Philippines in 2018.[2]His
works range from commissioned full-length ballets, theater
musicals, choral pieces, a Mass set to unaccompanied chorus,
and orchestral pieces, to commercial recordings of popular
music, film scores and television specials.Cayabyab's current
project includes the Ryan Cayabyab Singers (RCS), a group of
seven young adult singers comparable to his group Smokey
Mountain in the early 1990s. After FreemantleMedia decided
not to renew the Philippine Idol franchise, Cayabyab
transferred to rival show Pinoy Dream Academy (season
2), replacing Jim Paredes as the show's headmaster. PDA 2
started on June 14, 2008. He also became the chairman of the
board of judges for GMA Network's musical-reality show To
The Top.He is the executive director of the Philpop MusicFest
Foundation Inc., the organization behind the Philippine
Popular Music Festival. This songwriting competition for
amateurs and professionals puts the spotlight on songwriters
and encourages Filipinos to preserve their unique musical
identity. Born Raymundo Cayabyab in 1954 in Santa
Cruz, Manila, he suffered the death of his mother, Celerina Venson Pujante (she died of cancer at the age
of 43), when he was 6 years old. His father, Alberto Austria Cayabyab, who was an ordinary government
employee, struggled to support him and his three siblings. An opera singer and a college professor at the
UP School of Music (to whom he considered her as his first piano teacher), his mother's dying wish was
that none of the children pursue a music career, as she knew how hard life it was, with often low earnings.
At the age of 4, Cayabyab began his musical education with piano lessons.Cayabyab initially took up
Bachelor of Science in Business Administration in the University of the Philippines, Diliman. Looking for
work to support his studies, he landed with then-Senator Salvador Laurel as accompanist for the Chorale
Ensemble of the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP). Noticing Cayabyab's exceptional talent on
playing the piano, Laurel offered Cayabyab a scholarship to enable him to pursue an education in music.

Antonio Molina (26 December 1894 – 29 January 1980)

was a Filipino composer, conductor and music administrator.
He was named a National Artist of the Philippines for his
services to music. He was also known as the Claude
Debussy of the Philippines due to his use
of impressionist themes in his music.
Molina was born in Quiapo, Manila, the son of Juan Molina, a
government official, who founded the Molina Orchestra.[1]:147 He
attended the Escuela Catolica de Nuestro Padre Jesus
Nazareno in Quiapo, Manila, and college at San Juan De
Letran where he was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree in
1909.
 Col. Antonino Ramirez Buenaventura (4 May 1904
– 25 January 1996)[1] was
a Filipino composer, conductor, and teacher.Antonino
Buenaventura was born on May 4, 1904
in Baliuag, Bulacan. He was born in a family of
musicians; his father Lucino Buenaventura was a
musician at the Spanish Artillery Band in Intramuros.
He studied under Nicanor Abelardo at the University
of the Philippines Diliman Conservatory of Music and
graduated in 1932 with a Teacher’s Diploma in Music,
major in Science and Composition and became an
assistant instructor at the Conservatory. He also
studied composition for a post-graduate
degree under Jenő Takács.[2][3]
After the war he became conductor of the
devastated Philippine Constabulary Band for 16 years
and he brought it back to its former glory.
He became the music director of
the UST Conservatory of Music in 1961 and
the UE School of Music and Arts in 1964.
He married the violinist Rizalina Exconde and produced 4 children.[2][4] Buenaventura's music was
influenced by different ethnic Philippine folksongs. In 1935, he joined Francisca Reyes-Aquino in
researching Philippine folksongs and dances.[5] In 1936 he composed the accompaniment to the folk
dance "Pandanggo sa Ilaw" and incorporated ethnic melodies and instruments to some of his
compositions. [2][6]

Alfredo Santos Buenaventura was born in Santa Maria,

Bulacan in 1929 and studied music at the University of
Santo Tomas, the Centro Escolar University and the
Gregorian Institute. His career brought him teaching
appointments at the Philippine Women’s University, St.
Scholastica’s College and at the Centro Escolar University,
where he became Dean of Music at the conservatory. He
was formerly organist at the Metropolitan Cathedral in
Manila and, among many other honours, received the
Republican Cultural Heritage Awards in 1964 and 1972 and
the Bonifacio Centennial Awards.The compositions of
Alfredo Buenaventura include a number of operas,
symphonic poems, vocal works and chamber music.

Lucio D. San Pedro (February 11, 1913 – March 31, 2002)

was a Filipino composer and teacher who was
proclaimed National Artist of the Philippines for Music in
1991.[1] San Pedro came from a family with musical roots and
he began his career early. When he was still in his late teens,
he succeeded his deceased grandfather as the local church
organist. By then, he had already
composed songs, hymns and two complete masses for
voices and orchestra. After studying with several prominent
musicians in the Philippines, he took advanced composition
training with Bernard Wagenaar of the Netherlands. He also
studied harmony and orchestration under Vittorio
Giannini and took classes at Juilliard in 1947.His other
vocation was teaching. He has taught at the Ateneo de
Manila University, virtually all the major music conservatories
in Manila[citation needed], and at the College of Music of
the University of the Philippines, Diliman, where he retired as
a full professor in 1978. He later received the title Professor
Emeritus from the University in 1979.[citation needed] He also
became a faculty member of the Centro Escolar
University Conservatory of Music in Manila.
 Josefino Chino Toledo is a composer-conductor. He is
currently the Executive Director of Miriam
College Center for Applied Music, and a full professor
of music composition and theory at the University of the
Philippines. Toledo is the founding music director of
Metro-Manila Concert Orchestra (MMCO) and
the Grupo 20/21, a modular music ensemble.
Chino studied music at the University of the Philippines,
Cleveland Institute of Music – Case Western Reserve
University in the U.S., and at the Conservatoire National
Superieur de Musique in Paris.

As a conductor, he is noted for premiering works of

Filipino composers as well as other Asian composers and
has conducted concerts in Japan, Indonesia, Australia,
and China. He was the associate artistic director and
conductor of the first Asia-Europe Music Camp by the
Asia-Europe Foundation.

Toledo’s own compositions are regularly performed in international festivals, concerts and
recitals in US, Canada, Lithuania, Brazil, Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, France, Austria,
Netherlands, Germany, and almost all Asian countries.

José Montserrat Maceda (January 31, 1917 – May 5, 2004)

was a Filipino composer and ethnomusicologist.[1] Maceda was
born in Manila, Philippines, and
studied piano, composition and musical analysis at École
Normale de Musique de Paris in France. After returning to the
Philippines, he became a professional pianist, and later
studied musicology at Columbia University,
and anthropology at Northwestern University.
Starting in 1952, he conducted fieldwork on the ethnic Music
of the Philippines. From about 1954, he was involved in
the research and composition of musique concrète. In 1958,
he worked at a recording studio in Paris which specialized in
musique concrète. During this period, he met Pierre
Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Iannis Xenakis. In 1963,
Maceda earned a doctorate in ethnomusicology from
the UCLA. He began pursuing a compositional career more
vigorously. At the same time, he held concerts in Manila until
1969, in which he performed and conducted. This series of
concerts introduced Boulez, Xenakis and Edgard Varèse to
the Filipino public. As an ethnomusicologist, Maceda
investigated various forms of music in Southeast Asia,
producing numerous papers and even composing his own
pieces for Southeast Asian instruments. His notable works
include: Pagsamba for 116 instruments, 100 mixed and 25 male voices (1968); Cassette 100 for
100 cassette players (1971); Ugnayan for 20 radio stations (1974); Udlot-Udlot for several hundred
to several thousand people (1975); Suling-Suling for 10 flutes, 10 bamboo buzzers and 10
flat gongs (1985). In 1977, Maceda aimed to study Philippine folk songs which he describes as
having more focus on rhythm rather than time measure.[2] From the 1990s, he also composed for
Western orchestra and piano. The examples are: Distemperament for orchestra (1992); Colors
without Rhythm for orchestra (1999); Sujeichon for 4 pianos (2002).
Jose Maceda collected audio records materials of traditional music amongst various populations in
Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia, part of these audio archives are deposited in the CNRS –
Musée de l’Homme audio archives in France (a digitized version is available online). His entire
musical collections were inscribed in the UNESCO Memory of the World Register in 2007, as
submitted by the U.P. Center for Ethnomusicology and nominated by the Philippine government.
 Lucrecia Roces Kasilag (31 August 1918 – 16 August 2008)[1] was
a Filipino composer and pianist. She is particularly known for
incorporating indigenous Filipino instruments into orchestral
productions. Lucrecia “King” Roces Kasilag was born in San
Fernando, La Union, Philippines, the third of the six children of
Marcial Kasilag, Sr., a civil engineer, and his wife Asuncion Roces
Ganancial, a violinist and a violin teacher.[2]:87–88 She was Kasilag's
first solfeggio teacher. The second was Doña Concha Cuervo, who
was a strict Spanish woman. Kasilag later studied under Doña Pura
Villanueva, during which time performed her first public
piece, Felix Mendelssohn's May Breezes, at a student recital
when she was ten years old.[2]Kasilag grew up in Paco, Manila,
where she was educated at Paco Elementary School and graduated
valedictorian in 1930. She then transferred to Philippine Women's
University for high school, where in 1933 she also graduated as
valedictorian. For college, she graduated cum laude in 1936 with a
Bachelor of Arts, majoring in English, in the same university. She also
studied music at St. Scholastica’s College in Malate, Manila,
with Sister Baptista Battig, graduating with a Music Teacher's
Diploma, major in piano, in 1939.[2]:89[3]During World War II, she took
up composition, and on 1 December 1945, she performed her own
compositions in a concert at Philippine Women's University. From 1946 to 1947, Kasilag taught at
the University of the Philippines’ Conservatory of Music and worked as secretary-registrar at Philippines
Women's University.She completed a Bachelor of Music in 1949, and then attended the Eastman School of
Music in Rochester, New York, studying theory with Allen I. McHose and composition with Wayne
Barlow. Kasilag returned to the Philippines, and in 1953 she was appointed Dean of the Philippines Women's
University College of Music and Fine Arts.[4]
Manila, Philippines.[6]

Francisco Feliciano (19 February 1941 – 19

September 2014) was a Filipino composer and
conductor. He was a National Artist of the
Philippines for Music.[1] Feliciano was born in
1941, in Morong, Rizal.[2]
Francisco Feliciano graduated from the
University of the Philippines with a Teacher's
diploma in Music (1967) with a Masters in Music
Composition (1972). In 1977 he went to
the Hochschule der Kuenste in Berlin, Germany
to obtain a diploma in Music Composition. In
1979 he attended Yale University School of
Music and graduated with a Master of Musical
Arts and a Doctorate in Musical Arts,
Composition. While at Yale University he
conducted the Yale Contemporary Ensemble,
considered as one of the leading performing
groups in America for contemporary and avant-
garde music.[3] His teachers in conducting
were Arthur Weisberg and Martin Behrmann,
while he studied composition under Jacob
Druckman, Isang Yun, H.W. Zimmerman
and Krzysztof Penderecki.
He died in September 19, 2014, in Manila.
 Ramon Pagayon Santos was born on
February 25, 1941. He received his Bachelor
of Music Composition and Conducting from
University of the Philippines Conservatory of
Music in 1965, his Master of Music with
distinction from Indiana University in 1969,
and his Doctor of Philosophy from State
University of New York at Buffalo in 1972.
He was also a student in summer courses in
New Music at Darmstadt in 1974 and in
Special Seminars in Ethnomusicology at the
University of Illinois in 1989. He has studied
composition with Hilarion Rubio, Lucio San
Pedro, Thomas Beversdorf, Roque Cordero,
Ramon Fuller, and William Koethe. He has
taken contemporary music courses with
Istvan Anhalt and George Perle and has
studied Ethnomusicology with Bruno Nettl.
He has also studied Javanese music and
dance with Sundari Wisnusubroto and Nan
Kuan with Lao Hong Kio.

Santos has held the position of

Commissioner of the Sub-committee on the
Arts of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts since 1998, University Professor
since 1995, Chairman and Secretary General of the Music Competitions for Young Artists
Foundation from 1989 to 1997. He also currently holds the positions of Secretary of the
League of Filipino Composers, Member of the ISCM Advisory Panel on the World’s Musical
Cultures, Lecturer for the Asian Instituts for Liturgy and Music, Member of the Humanities
Division of the National Research Council of the Philippines. His past positions include
Artistic Director of the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Chairman of the Asian Composers
League (1994-1997), Dean of UP College of Music (1978-1988), and President of the
National Music Council of the Philippines (1984-1993).

Among awards he has received are Composer-in-Residence of Bellagio Study

Center/Rockefellar Foundation (1997); Artist-in-Residence, Civitella Ranieri Center (1998);
Acheivement Award in the Humanities from National Research Council of the Philippines
(1994); Fellowships from the Asian Cultural Council and The Ford Foundation (1998-1989);
and Chevalier de l’Ordre des Artes et Lettres, French Government.
 Levi Celerio (April 30, 1910 – April 2, 2002) was
a Filipino composer and lyricist who is credited to writing
not less than 4,000 songs. Celerio was recognized as
a National Artist of the Philippines for Music and
Literature in 1997.He is also known for using the leaf as
a musical instrument which led to being recognized as
the "only man who could play music using a leaf" by
the Guinness Book of Records[citation needed]. This led to him
making guest appearance in television shows recorded
outside the Philippines.Aside from being a musician,
Celerio is also poet. He was also a film actor who
appeared in various Philippine films of the 1950s and
1960s. Levi Celerio was born on April 30, 1910,
in Tondo, Manila to Cornelio Cruz and Juliana Celerio
and was born to a poor family. Celerio's affinity for music
was a result of influence from his mother who is
a harpist and a member of a church choir.[1] He was
estranged from his father who is involved in the real
estate and jewelry business. His father was never
married to his mother.[2]His mother encouraged him to be
involved in music as a distraction from the squalid conditions of their neighborhood. Despite of this,
Celerio became a close acquaintance of gang leader Asiong Salonga. At his mother's encouragement
Celerio started playing the violin at age 11 taking lessons from a member of the Philippine
Constabulary Band. Celerio later performed with the band as its member while simultaneously
attending Torres High School.[1] It was during in his high school years, Celerio learned about his
father.cHe also attended the University of the Philippines Conservatory of Music to study violin for two
semesters.[1] Then director Alexander Lippay recommended him for a scholarship at the Academy of
Music in Manila.[3] He received scholarship and became the youngest member of the Manila
Symphony Orchestra.[4]
MIGUEL “MIKE” GUISON VELARDE JR.
- composer, conductor, movie actor, and
musical director
- born in Manila on October 23, 1913 as the second
of two children of Dr. Miguel Velarde, Sr. and Dolores
Guison
- his family moved to Zamboanga when he was only
one year old and where he spent the succeeding
eighteen years of his life
- His exposure to the unaffected and unpretentious
environment of Basilan and Zamboanga had
influenced his creative imagination, mainly nurtured
by his mother who became his first music teacher in
piano and violin when he was six years old
- studied at the Zamboanga Normal School, where he
became a member of the school orchestra and
graduated as valedictorian
- He learned the basics of harmony and composition
from Antonio Molina
and Ariston Avelino as he further deepened his musical knowledge through self-study
- opened a jazz school and became song editor for the Philippines Free
Press
- went into writing Tagalog songs, composing the song Ugoy-Ugoy Blues which opened opportunities for
him in the movie
- He had a jazz band known as “Mike Velarde’s Jazztocrats”
- became editor of the Literary Song Movie Magazine
 Ernani Joson Cuenco (May 10, 1936 – June 11,
1988) was a Filipino composer,[1] film scorer, musical
director and music teacher and Philippine National Artist
for Music. He wrote an outstanding and memorable body
of works that resonate with the Filipino sense of musicality
and which embody an ingenious voice that raises the
aesthetic dimensions of contemporary Filipino music.
Cuenco played with the Filipino Youth Symphony
Orchestra and the Manila Symphony Orchestra from 1960
to 1968, and the Manila Chamber Soloists from 1966 to
1970. He completed a music degree in piano and cello
from the University of Santo Tomas where he also taught
for decades until his death in 1988. He was proclaimed
National Artist for Music in 1999; He was an award-winning
film scorer in the early 1960s, working in collaboration with
National Artist for Music Levi Celerio. He was also a
teacher and a seasoned orchestra player.
His songwriting credits include "Nahan, Kahit na Magtiis,"
and "Diligin Mo ng Hamog ang Uhaw na Lupa," "Pilipinas,"
"Inang Bayan," "Isang Dalangin," "Kalesa," "Bato sa
Buhangin" and "Gaano Ko Ikaw Kamahal." The latter song
shows how Cuenco enriched the Filipino love ballad by adding the elements of kundiman to it.

CONSTANCIO DE GUZMAN
- born on November 11, 1903 in Guiguinto, Bulacan
- grew up in Manila where he studied piano and
composition under Nicanor Abelardo
- went to law school but switched to pursue and
finish a BS Commerce degree at Jose Rizal College in
1928
- passed the certified public accountants (CPA)
board examinations in 1932
- acknowledged as the “Dean of Filipino Movie
Composers and Musical Directors”
- became the music director of movie production
companies like Sampaguita, LVN, Royal, Excelsior,
Lea, and Tagalog Ilang-Ilang Productions
- his “unexpected” hit music, Panaginip, paved the
way for him to record hundreds of songs,
principally under Villar and Columbia Records.
- In 1948, his song Ang Bayan Ko and Kung Kita’y
Kapiling won the gold medal at the Paris International Fair
- De Guzman passed away on August 16, 1982.
- Bayan Ko was later adopted as the symbolic song of the People Power Movement of 1986. The
same song won for him the Awit Award for Best Filipino Lyricist.
 RESTITUTO “RESTIE” UMALI

- born in Paco, Manila on June 16, 1916. His early

exposure to music was due to the influence of his father
who taught him violin as well as his exposure to the regular
family rondalla

- was also taught solfeggio and score readingat the Mapa

High School where he became an active member of the
school glee club and orchestra

- played the E-flat horn, trombone, and tuba when he was

part of the UST (University of Santo Tomas) Band

- also taught choral arranging and orchestration at the

UST Conservatory of Music

- majored in Composition and Conducting at the Conservatory of Music, University of the Philippines
(UP) and Commerce at the Jose Rizal College.

- passed an electrician’s course at the Philippine School of Arts and Trades before embarking on a
rewarding career as musical scorer for movies.

- arranged the Philippine national anthem and the local classic Kataka-taka for the Boston Pops
Orchestra when it performed for the Philippine Independence Night in Boston in 1972

- composed approximately 120 movie theme songs and more than 250 scores for movies

- His musical scoring career was capped by a Universal Pictures’ production of No Man Is An Island
starred by Jeffrey Hunter and Barbara Perez

- His musical scores for the movies Sa Bawat Pintig ng Puso (1964), Pinagbuklod ng Langit (1969), Mga
Anghel na Walang Langit (1970), and Ang Alamat (1972) won for him “Best Musical Score” honors at the
Filipino Academy of Movies Arts and Sciences (FAMAS Awards)

- garnered the “Best Music Awards” for Bitter-Sweet at the 1969 Manila Film Festival andAng Agila at
Ang Araw at the 1973 Olongapo Film Festival.