Contracting Genealogy
There are several veins of creative practice in which the present sound practice could be traced. Some of which were music, performance art, and visual arts.
From music, sound practitioners in Manila, in more than one occasion, have claimed to have been inspired by Philippine’s National Artist for Music, Jose Maceda. Practitioners are mostly referring to his compositions using radio and cassettes. In the recent years, with the access to Maceda’s archive, new inspirations have been drawn from his writings, and works in ethnomusicology. Also being recognized is Lucrecia Kasilag, another National Artist for Music, for her employment of electronics in music composition. They are thus part of this attempt to create genealogy for sound practice because artists draw inspiration from and recognize affinity with their creativity.
From performance art, the experimentations done by Raymundo Albano, with Judy Freya Sibayan and a number of other artists, have opened up a strongly conceptual and critical approach in performance. The idea that the artist is the maker of what is exhibited, and himself is exhibited (or watched as a performer), can well be understood within Albano and Sibayan’s framework of art productions. At present, it is very common for sound practitioners to engage a performance in their exhibit and to display their tools/ instruments in the performance.
From visual arts, it is the inclusion of sound or sounding of art works exhibited is what Agnes Arellano contributed to the present sound practice. Arellano exhibited works where the where the sonic component of the artwork is intentional rather than incidental; the sounding is conceived as part of the artwork’s corpus. Arellano thus is one of the pioneers in demanding from art installation audience to listen to the work, as much as they look at it.
It is by virtue of being an inspiration, having affinity to the creative process, and by introducing a lasting innovation in the consumption of art; these are but three possible sources where the archaeology of sound practice in Manila can begin.