Founder

Chairman Emeritus

One of the 1959 theater reviewers actually presaged this, Walter Terry of the New York Herald Tribune. He wrote: “ Bayanihan is one of the newest examples of an ethnic dance culture which has gone beyond simple preservation (as important as that is) and into creative growth.”

He also described what would be the Bayanihan’s enduring and consistent way of presenting Philippine folk culture. The Program “is skillfully ordered so that one sees in swiftly paced, contrasting suites the various steps, costumes and customs of wide area of the Philippines. We are carried from the elemental, wild and free dances of primitive mountain people to the refined actions of those touched by Spanish culture; from the Orient-slanted gestures of the Muslim inhabitants to a wide selection of regional dances and rural scenes of work and play.”

Here are the two key elements that have kept Bayanihan continuously relevant and its appeal fresh even if the audiences now are the sons and daughters or even grandchildren of the audiences it delighted half a century ago. It did not get mired in a time-warp. In the words of Mr. Terry, it went “beyond simple preservation into “creative growth” with “skillfully ordered and swiftly paced” presentations.

But Bayanihan could not have gone from folklore into creative growth without a very critical supportive element: Research. Bayanihan never stopped its research into Philippine folk culture. In some instances it even researched comparative folkways in other societies, particularly those with which Philippine culture has been and is interlaced and inter-related. The findings further enriched and brought into better perspective its discoveries and insights into our own folk culture.

Folk culture itself undergoes this process. One tribe or clan expresses itself through its music and dances. Succeeding generations enlarge and innovate on the same cultural base to respond to changing tastes and perceptions. This constant and continuing process is the evolution of culture over the years. It involves creative growth, one generation improving upon what it found in the previous generation.

People and their culture evolve in tune and in time with generational succession. Those who remain frozen in time and cultural dimension are soon left behind. They become irrelevant, uninteresting and uninspiring. They cannot excite and engage new audiences.

Thankfully Bayanihan has avoided getting into this rut.

So now, half a century after Broadway, the Bayanihan audience has become global, not just those it thrilled in the Great White Way but audiences all over the world. But as always Bayanihan is dedicated to the audience that first recognized it the Philippine audience. Even if that audience is now the heirs and successors of the audience of half a century ago.

Truly, Bayanihan today is Beyond Folklore.