Here and There

 

The inimitable John Lesaca 
By Gerry Garcia  

 

 

 

 

Another surprise entertainer from Metro Manila, aside from Gary Valenciano and Dagupeña Mocha, invited by PRISAA honcho Gonz Duque to add color to the just ended national games here in Pangasinan, was Pinoy jazz fiddler John Lesaca, probably the one and only professional violinist in the country who has been able to eke out a living from playing pop music. And apparently the success he achieved playing a classic -oriented instrument before low-brow music aficionados has been resounding.

This writer, who is himself a classical music addict, has to hand it to Lesaca for being able to draw fanatic cheers from his pop music audiences.
                                                                   

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I had occasion to watch and actually hear this remarkable young man’s performance last Tuesday at Dr. Ado Duque’s President Hotel Lobby in Lingayen. And I could see why his rapport with the listening crowd was complete. His outreach was fruitful and satisfying because he was using an electric violin and the music he played was the folksy type, not high-brow.

Although I did not have a chance to talk with him personally yet, I have the impression that he was never impressed by the fame of the late Redentor Romero, violinist-guest conductor of symphony orchestras here and abroad. And neither was Red, who was my bosom chum and former classmate in a violin school once, appreciative of Lesaca’s violin playing style.

Red Romero once spoke derisively of John Lesacas’s skill in violin playing (and this was cited actually in the national papers)   . . .  suggesting that Lesaca had no formal training at all. That’s why I presume that Lesaca, who must not have missed reading that news item, hated Red Romero.

But even if I and Red were on the same wave-length, I did not share Red’s impression of the young jazz violinist. John is in his own turf anyway, playing the kind of music he wants, popular and jazzy, and we have no business deriding the way he plays his violin.

John has proven to this writer that, as was shown in his performance at Ado’s President Hotel in Lingayen early this week, he has endeared himself to an adoring public who find him and his electric violin a source of fun and exhilaration.