Finally, A New Home for Loboc's World Class Music

They have performed in the country’s most important stages, and have trotted around the globe leaving audiences worldwide captivated by their angelic voices from different halls in the United States to the theatres in the European countries of Spain, France, Italy, & Germany, to the many cities in Asia, like Hongkong, and the cultural centers of China, specifically in Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, Jiangxhi, and Hangzhou.
For years, home to the Loboc Children’s Choir is the centuries-old Parish church of San Pedro Apostol. While the convento is a fitting sanctuary for the cherubs’ singing rehearsals, the church had been transformed many times to function as a concert hall.

Now, at long last, they have a state-of-the-art theatre they can call their own and where peoples from everywhere can catch an experience of a lifetime to hear their music that flows resplendently and naturally as the emerald green waters of Loboc River.

“It’s a dream come true for us,” elatedly reveals Madam Alma Fernando Taldo, the choir’s conductor. “We cannot really thank him enough; he’s really like a father to us all.” Madam Taldo is referring to the theatre’s benefactor, Ambassador Carlos Chan.

It was in February of 2005 when the Loboc Children’s Choir was invited by the Liwayway (China) Co. Ltd, Marketing Corporation led by its officials Carlson Chan and Shera Chan (children of Amb. Carlos Chan) in a back-to-back concert with the Little Children’s Cultural Troupe from the Shanghai Chapter of the Soong Ching Ling Foundation at the Meralco Theater in Manila.

The success of that joint performance led to a similar concert, this time at the Lyceum Theater of Shanghai in July 2005. The LCC performed with the Shanghai Oriental Little Companion Art Troupe, the performing arts arm of the China Welfare Institute (CWI), founded by Soong Ching Ling (Madame Sun Yat-Sen), the late honorary President of the People’s Republic of China.

A foundation has been established after her with the aim to carry forward the spirit of love for children and the concern for their healthy growth in mind and body which she displayed during her lifetime. Amb. Chan had served as President of the Philippine Soong Ching Ling Foundation and his love for the singing children has certainly extended to all the people of Bohol, especially the Lobocanons.
It was during that 2005 performance at the CWI Children’s Palace in Shanghai when Amb. Chan shared to the choir and the Bohol delegation his desire to have a similar showplace in Loboc. Hence, the theater was first named Loboc Children’s Palace. Madam Taldo could hardly believe that in two years, that vision was transformed into a reality.

Last Aug. 24, no less than Pres. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo arrived in Loboc to inaugurate the theater and the access road to it. The choir regaled the President and the dignitaries who became the first to sit down inside the fully air-conditioned theater that accommodates a hundred people. Madam Taldo reveals that Amb. Chan himself had seen to it that the theater’s acoustics, sound and lighting facilities were all state-of-the-art and an expert from Manila was sent to oversee its initial operations.

In the evening of the same day, local and foreign guests, which include a 20-man delegation of Chinese businessmen and investors brought by Amb. Chan were treated to a spectacular affair, starting off with a dinner by the jumbo bridge that affords an awesome view overlooking the river, with the well-lighted docking port and the Loboc tourism complex on one side and the parish church of San Pedro Apostol on the other side.

That night, the bridge finally rises above the ill fame it has brought upon the town for decades. Right there atop the infamous bridge, guests were brought to a different time and place, with the same refreshing feeling one gets while cruising placidly along the river. The music of the local musicians just floated in the breeze, as Loboc is “labyanan sa mabugnawng hangin.” Later in the evening program, the governor revealed that Pres. Arroyo will soon turn over the bridge to the municipal government so it can be used for various social and cultural functions. The idea that the dances and songs currently performed at Busai will be transferred in the area so as to maintain the serenity of the upstream cruise was also floated during the evening conversations.

After a toast led by Governor Aumentado and Ambassador Chan, the group convened at the theater to a first-rate performance of the Loboc Children’s Choir, the Loboc Youth Choir and the recently-established Loboc Youth Band. That very night, the audience cannot help but conclude that Loboc is indeed Bohol’s capital for music and the arts.