Insights from Ebe Dancel

Previously, I was able to see the launch of Pioneer Insurance’s Campus Caravan. This time, the target is the aspiring songwriters.  Last year, it was for playwrights and the year before that was for short movies. For this Caravan, I was able to attend at University of the Philippines- Los Banos campus.

I was only going to document the event but I never thought I will get insights from Ebe Dancel. I was never a fan but I got to appreciate his music that he wrote for mainstream artists and he also does workshops just like this caravan.

For Ebe Dancel, songwriters are also storytellers. This I agree. We Filipinos have a heritage of minstrels especially in harana (serenade) which is not far from Ebe’s songs.  He shared that in his younger years, there was no internet yet and he is in the province, airwaves are limited and his only source of songs is the songs that his mother sang. Then he sang a couple of lines of Moon River. This was the first time I heard him sang in English because most of his original works are in Tagalog.

Back to his talks, one of the tips that he points out was that a song writer should be an observer. He shared that most of his songs gets content from his immediate surroundings. His base of residency, Los Banos, is an ideal place for observation especially the campus setting. This is also true for a blogger like me, I also like to observe.

There are lots of interactions from the audience which are mostly students. They were eager and asked the right questions. The organizers said that this was one of their best caravans that produced results. Even a high school student aged as young as 16 participated in the discussion. It was a mutual and informal workshop. There were 140 participants.

Yael Yuson also shared his insights and hosted the caravan. I will not publish all what Ebe pointed out because you might also want to attend his workshops and my blog post will get long. Pioneer Insurance has a songwriting contest with the theme, #MoveOnLang. This was made possible by Pioneer Insurance and FILSCAP. The contest is extended until November 15. For more events from Pioneer Insurance, follow this blog and like https://www.facebook.com/LENSblogs/ . I got to check out Entablado next time I get back in Los Banos.

Pioneer Insurance Campus Caravan Songwriting Contest

Last year, Pioneer Insurance sponsored another Campus Tour with The Virgin Labfest in collaboration with Tanghalang Pilipino. This time, the craft is song writing. The collaborators for this year are with FILSCAP, the biggest name in the song writing industry in the country.

Signing of MOU

In the launch, we are not only witnessing the signing of the memorandum of understanding between the collaborating parties but also performances and testimony of the artists present of how they started their career as songwriters.

FILSCAP is a governing body of songwriters that protects their rights especially copyrights if there are concerns infringement. It also involves protection against piracy. Just so happens, that my high school classmate was also part of FILSCAP.

The purpose why Pioneer is doing projects like these because of the negative image of insurance in the country. But if you use a medium like music, video and theatre arts, etc., you get the people interested and orient them.

The theme of the song needs to be relevant to today's theme which is "#MoveOnLang". Present during the signing of the MOU are Pioneer Insurance's Mr. Lorenzo Chan, Jr. and FILSCAP's Rico Blanco(see photo). We were also entertained by the music of the band, Sandwich and Raimond Marasigan also shared his insights of songwriting.

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