Salima
by Stella Estremera
Sunstar Davao
IT wasn't properly announced to the general public, anyway. But there it was one weekday evening two weeks ago at Taboan: the re-staging of Salima, a concert-theatre performance on peace and evacuation from the eyes of Salima, an evacuee.
The cast in their costumes don't break into any song and dance ensemble. Guys are serious with their music, and the emotions are imparted through the words, the tone, the rhythm. It's all there. You only need to feel and listen to it.
Salima is a product of a seven-day workshop of musicians of various political and musical persuasions sometime in July 2003. You can actually hear interplay of all these persuasions while you listen to the performers on stage sing.
Yes, the theme may sound worn especially for those who sneer at activism, and yes, there are a number of those in this part of the city, but its musicality is a fresh touch, even the most indifferent cannot help but lend an ear.
Its made up of 11 musical masterpieces that only Davao artists, embedded in an island of seasonal turbulence and multi-cultural influences while enjoying metropolitan conveniences, can come up with. Rock, rap, jazz, country, blues, and even pop and yes... a little bit of chants too, for what is Mindanao without it.
