Role: Volunteer Social Media Associate | Organization: Filipino American Symphony Orchestra
While I don't make music as much I used to, I enjoy watching musicians experiment online in my free time. I stumbled upon a project called "5 COMPOSERS 1 THEME," featuring composers David Bruce, Ben Levin, Adam Neely, Nahre Sol, and Tantacrul. Watching these folks take on the challenge of synthesizing five musical themes into one piece and react to each other's creations was thrilling. Especially since I have a soft spot for open-ended games that incorporate art-making.
While pushing for the Filipino American Symphony Orchestra (FASO) to start its own YouTube channel amidst the COVID-19 pandemic as FASO's volunteer Social Media Associate, I knew that I wanted the orchestra to run with the 5 Composers 1 Theme concept on the channel.
Background
After getting the green light on the channel and securing project funding in spring 2021, we chose five Philippine and American folk song themes, and assembled a team of emerging Pilipinx American composers, orchestra members, and video editors. Once the project kicked off, I was in the creative hot seat. It was time to market this. What started as an event banner eventually became a trailer.
How It Started
For the banner's background, I wanted to mimic our composers' synthesis of Philippine and American folk song themes. It was important for both motifs to come from roughly the same time period. As an art historian, I've often been frustrated when artists and writers situate non-Western people and their art into an imagined, romanticized past. These folks often fail to recognize the realities that non-Western people encounter in the modern world. I avoided making the banner's Pilipinx component seem antiquated or other in juxtaposition with the American component.
I used the era in which these folk songs were codified in writing or as recordings to anchor these two components. A majority of these folk songs our composers synthesized, including "Old MacDonald Had a Farm" and "Bahay Kubo," were either written or recorded around the late 1800s and 1900s. I found the following textiles in the public domain.
I found an image of a "binakol," or ceremonial blanket, from up north in the Philippines' Luzon region made in the 20th century. This textile's hypnotic checkered pattern plays tricks on the viewer's eye, almost like a holographic "Pokémon" card. I knew this had to be in the banner.
I also found this American quilt from the late 19th century. The design's eagle and stars undoubtedly scream, "'Merica!" Perfect.
In the foreground, I wanted to feature the five composers — Nilo Alcala, Jem Talaroc, Melissa Orquiza, Nhick Ramiro Pacis, and Saunder Choi. I isolated the headshots I collected for the spotlight articles I wrote for the FASO website. I also played with the Camera Raw filter for each of the textiles in Photoshop, and slapped on our new logo and the video title. Here's what I got at first.
I got the Philippine textile even more psychedelic with those colors, but I knew that this needed more tweaking. The background didn't seem like a synthesis of those textiles. It lacked cohesion. The feedback I received from FASO team members supported that hunch, so it was back to the drawing board.
How It Went
I decided on a color scheme that brought cohesion into the design and a treatment that maintained the integrity of the textiles.
I was sold. My teammates were sold. Folks thought this was a fresh look that vibed with the energy of these emerging composers.
And How the Trailer Went
Then, I got a request from FASO's Education Director to make a trailer. Our video editors were occupied with stringing the composition footage and composer reactions together into the final video, so I stepped in.
When I edit videos, I usually let the music guide the frames. Since the Education Director probably had probably watched the compositions and reactions dozens of times before our editors touched them, I consulted him for footage highlights. I wanted this video to do a lot of things with our existing footage: to explain the project concept, and feature as many of the five compositions as possible, the most recognizable parts of each folk song, and the most memorable composer reaction. And I think what the Education Director and I curated together delivered on these asks.
Once we got the content and audio into a rough sequence, it was time to set the visual elements in time with the audio.
"Composers, assemble."
I animated parts of the banner to bring each composer in Avengers-style, as if the French horn on the composition playing in the background summoned them together.
Explain!
Captions, the musicians, and a spiel from Nhick Pacis Ramiro, the composer of the piece playing in the video, explain the project's concept together.
Featuring Five Folk Song Themes
I introduced the folk themes using their most recognizable parts across three compositions. (You'll notice that I cheated with “The Fa-So Theme," but let's face it. It's challenging to highlight two notes in a scale effectively without spelling them out onscreen!)
"Lovely ending!"
Here's the composer reaction I promised, between comedic punctuations of the "Old McDonald" ending that composer Nhick Ramiro Pacis wrote for us.
After screening the trailer for a focus group of FASO audience members, donors, musicians, volunteers, and staff, and having them fill out a quick survey, we tweaked the duration of some captions to make sure that they stayed onscreen long enough for audience members to read.
Then, it was ready to be premiered during our virtual fall concert, "A Celebration of Love."
Impact
We later circulated the trailer on YouTube and our social ahead of the project's premiere in October in honor of Pilipinx American History Month. Across platforms, to date, the trailer garnered over 11K views!
Wanna watch the full project (and see some of my camera work during host segments?) "5 Composers/1 Theme: A Filipino American Composition Project" is here.
Curious about the FASO style guide I wrote over the course of 2021? Check it out here.
Σχόλια