We had arrived just as the opening remarks were being said. The main theater was dimmed now, and the curtains were lifted, exposing the stage, bare, except for the musicians' chairs and the conductor's podium. We found our seats to the right of the theater because having arrived late, we were obliged to sit near the doors until the following intermission. I smiled to myself, thinking how long it was since last I was there, listening to the same orchestra. The same but different.

The first time I saw the Philippine Philharmonic, I think I was back in second year high school. My mom's bank was a donor to the institution, and in return, would be given box tickets to every performance (not only to the Philharmonic, but to ballets and other performances as well). Since then, I was hooked. Every time my schedule allowed, I would drag a couple of friends over (often, it would be Mr. Pagsi and his wife, and a some other interested Sibolistas) to the Cultural Center, and, on a Friday (or Saturday) night, we would indulge in an evening of classical music.

I even remember the most breathtaking performance of the orchestra I've seen: playing Rachmaninov's 5th piano concerto, Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini. The image itself was enthralling: there, aside from the seventy-odd instruments playing on stage, were two black grand pianos positioned side by side in front of the orchestra, beside the conductor's podium— they were not the baby grand pianos one normally finds in homes and showrooms; they were those imposingly long black Weinsteins that in every way really looked grand. Never have I heard two pianos play together, and no less than Cecille Licad and Rowena Arietta granted me the pleasure of an initiation.

And so, on this evening, the memories of those heady days returned to me with amazing clarity, because I had not had the opportunity to recall them for so long. I guess it was fitting, then, that the evening's performance was called Remembering.

I found it odd, at first, for the ticket to say that the performance would have Solita Monsod as narrator. Only when the first piece began— it was a work by Micheal Tilson Thomas— that I understood that the music would be interspersed with entries from the Diary of Anne Frank. Needless to say, it was rather heavy and tedious; I had the feeling that I was listening to a play on the radio.

The second piece, following the intermission (we had already moved to our ticket seats, orchestra center, in the middle of the theater!), was by Margaret Brouwer, and was written as a tribute to her recently-deceased husband. The piece started off quietly, mournfully even, but progressed quickly through pulses of harmonies both loud, at times, and evocative in others.

The evening ended with Beethoven's Symphony No. 1 in C-major, op. 21. While I appreciated the prior two pieces, it was certainly Beethoven that captivated me the most. I was amazed at how the master could do so much, yet with so very little: no brass, except for the horn and the trumpet, no gong, no piano, no cymbals; just a timpani strike here and there. And yet the soar was just as glorious, if not more.

Also— for the first time, I found myself moved by the music I was listening to: here, sometimes expectant; there, sometimes afraid; yet here again, relieved and peaceful. I mention this because for as long as I can remember, listening to the orchestra was somewhat of a mental activity for me, conscious always of what exactly was happening on the stage: the movement and beat of the conductor, the parts each instrument was playing, the delight at seeing the violin bows go up and down at the pulse of the music.

Yes, I did notice all these things again (and with Eugene Castillo conducting, you will certainly not only have an ear full, but an eye full as well— he might as well have been dancing a ballet on stage to the music of his own orchestra! The Washington Post called it, sculpting the air.), but in addition, I think, I paid less attention to what I saw, and allowed myself to get lost in what I heard. It made the experience all the more complete.

As the last strains of Beethoven's First wafted through the theater, the conductor holding up his hand in a suspenseful fermata, with the musicians straining to keep their positions as the last note diminished into silence, I could almost hear the beating of my own heart, and I knew that this night wouldn't be the last time we would be watching the Philippine Philharmonic. In that expectant silence, I thought: what a perfect moment.