Award-Winning Mandaue Children’s Choir Performs for Filipino-American Community in the Bay Area
10 May 2017 SAN FRANCISCO — The internationally acclaimed Mandaue Children’s Choir performed for the San Francisco Bay Area Community in a concert held at the Kalayaan Hall of the Philippine Center on Thursday, April 27.
The Choir, conducted by Mr. Dennis Sugarol, hails from Cebu City, and is in North America for a US and Canada tour. The choir sang Visayan folk, tribal and contemporary songs in a fifty-minute set before an audience of about a hundred people.
Michelle Waite, President of the Board of Directors in the US of Pandoo Foundation approached the Consulate to offer a cultural performance for the Community in exchange for exposure for the children, who are aged seven to 16 years old.
Consul General Henry S. Bensurto, Jr. explained that in the Consulate’s efforts to Spark* Connect* Empower* Filipinos all over the world, the Consulate took the opportunity to invite members of the Consular Corps, the Young Diplomats Club in San Francisco, the San Francisco-Manila Sister City Committee and Community leaders in and around the San Francisco Bay Area to expose them to a night of Philippine culture and talent.
The Mandaue Children’s Choir has performed internationally, bagging awards and gaining recognition for their excellence in performing, including the World Championship in the Children’s Choir Category in the Grand Prix Competition of the the First World Choir Championships in Gyeongnam, Korea, the Hong Kong International Youth and Children’s Choir Festival, and the top prize of the Georg Friedrich Handel Internationales Kinderchor Festival in Halle, Germany. The Office of the President of the Republic of the Philippines awarded the Choir the Ani ng Dangal Award three times, in 2009, 2010 and 2012.
Pandoo Foundation Executive Director Francois Perreault explained that Pandoo is a non-profit organization that “funds development programs in the areas of financial inclusion (micro lending), education, and Health & Sanitation, and links all of its related projects to kids playing Pandoo Nation. After successfully completing online game world missions, Kids have the opportunity to help fund a cause they believe in, and in return they receive a tactile experience of helping others in the developing world through real world connections with updates, pictures and stories that are real and organic.”
For more information, visit www.sanfranciscopcg.dfa.gov.ph/ www.philippinessanfrancisco.org or https://www.facebook.com/PCGSF. END
