Pinoy Pride: Arnel Pineda

Arnel Pineda, is a Filipino singer-songwriter who has served as the lead singer of the American rock band Journey since 2007.

Arnel has had a successful music career in the Philippines for 25 years, even before the Journey fame. Like most Filipino singers, he had a humble beginning. Arnel's family acquired deep debt when his mother died. His dad was forced to ask relatives to separate and take his siblings. At this time, Arnel quit school, was sleeping in the streets, and had to work odd jobs like cleaning scrap metal and docked ships, just to be able to strike out on his own.

But even at a young age, his parents instilled in him the love for music. In one interview, he revealed that one of his earlier idols were Barbara Streisand and Karen Carpenter. At 1982, at age 15, Arnel joined a group called Ijos Band. He formed and transferred to several bands since then. A talent agent spotted Pineda and his then group "New Age" and asked them to perform in Hongkong restaurants. Arnel worked in Hongkong for several years thereafter.

Like Charice, Arnel's career was hugely boosted thanks to Youtube. On June 28, 2007, Neal Schon of Journey contacted Noel Gomez, a longtime fan and friend of Pineda who uploaded many of his performance videos, to ask for Pineda's contact information. Schon sent an e-mail to Pineda inviting him to audition for Journey. The rest, as they say, is history. To quote this article:

Chilean media acclaimed Pineda's performance (translated to English): "The new vocalist fit very well with the band, his vocal aptitudes shining through, which are very similar to the legendary musician of the band, Steve Perry."^] Journey keyboardist Jonathan Cain described Pineda's performance in a radio interview: "We went to Chile just recently, where we had never played and they went crazy, they absolutely went nuts...Arnel's first show — talk about a stressful thing — we had a televised concert for 25 million people...Is the guy a winner? Yeah, he's a winner. He's a clutch player."

Journey's concerts with Arnel are huge hits. This is a video from his 2008 Las Vegas concert.

This is PinoyTunes The Podcast's feature on Arnel Pineda:

For the latest on Arnel, check out his official blog: http://arnelpinedarocks.com/


Source: Wikipedia

Pinoy Pride: Charice Pempengco

Charice Pempengco, or simply Charice to her fans, is a Filipino singer and actress who rose to popularity through Youtube. She is currently the most internationally hot shot singer from the Philippines.

She started her career almost like Regine Velasquez, joining small singing competitions all over the country at a tender age. In 2005, Charice joined Little Big Star, a talent show in the Philippines loosely patterned after American Idol. Eliminated after her first performance, she was called back as a wildcard contender and eventually became one of the finalists. Although she was a consistent top scorer in the final rounds, she did not win the title in the finale and only placed third. (Wikipedia)

Charice Pempengco in The Ellen Degeneres Show


Unlike Regine, her big break happened because of a fan and with the help of the internet. Someone under the username FalseVoice uploaded her video performances in Youtube - it received over 13 million hits. Through her international performance videos, Ellen DeGeneres found her and made an on-air invitation to guest her on The Ellen Degeneres show. Pempengco also appeared on the May 12 edition of The Oprah Winfrey Show in an episode entitled the "World's Smartest Kids", where she performed Whitney Houston's I Have Nothing.^[19] After the show, Oprah Winfrey contacted David Foster to see what the legendary music producer could do for Pempengco. David Foster liked her and held several well-recieved performances with her. In one of those concerts, Charice met Andrea Bocelli, her idol. Bocelli expressed his interest in performing a duet with her. Aside from her solo performance in Bocelli's birthday concert "The Cinema Tribute", she also sang a duet of "The Prayer" with the famous tenor in front of more than 8,000 people.

 Charice in GLEE


In an ABC News interview, David Foster mentioned that she has the ability to mimic other people's voices, which, according to him, is a characteristic of good singers. In a separate interview, Josh Groban stated that Charice's voice is one of the most beautiful voices he has heard in a long time. The New York Post once called her a vocal prodigy for being able to sing 'big songs' even at her tender age. Ryan Murphy, the executive music producer of the hit US television series Glee, said, "When that girl opens her mouth, angels fly out."

PinoyTunes features Charice in this week's episode:

For more information about Charice, check out her website: http://www.charicemusic.com/

Source: Wikipedia

Pinoy Pride: Regine Velasquez

Regine Velasquez is one of the best singers the Philippines has ever produced. She's known as "Asia's Songbird" for her exceptionally wide and powerful vocal range. She has 30 albums under her belt, winning 59 awards locally and internationally.

 Regine has also won acting awards from her performances in television and film. Aside from being a singer-actress, she is also a record producer, TV host, and philanthropist. "My family was really poor, so I wanted to help them.. I wanted to send my siblings to school and I was able to. That's my greatest achievement actually," said Regine in an interview on CNN Talk Asia. Her philanthropy involved projects with Duty Free Philippines, Hongkong's AIDS foundation, Singapore's National Kidney Foundation, UNICEF, and many others.

                              Music Video: Regine Velasquez's "And I Love You So"


Regine claims that she learned singing even before she could read. To train her voice, her father let her sing neck-deep in the ocean - supposedly to strengthen her stomach muscles and increase lung power. Today, she credits her vocal abilities to her dad who remains dearly close to her. Her career started in small singing contests all over the country until she won a recording deal with Octoarts. The rest, as they say is history.


Other interesting facts about Regine Velasquez:


 - In 1991, she performed an outstanding performance at the Carnegie Hall, one of the most prestigious venues in the world for classical and popular music. She was the first solo Filipino act there.


- In her career she has joined about 200 competitions and won 60 of them.


- She directed most of her own music videos, concerts and TV shows.


- She does her own makeup.


-After seven years of being together, Regine and Ogie Alcasid (another Filipino singer-songwriter), announced their engagement at a noontime show.





They got married on December 22, 2010 in Nasugbu, Batangas, Philippines.




Listen to PinoyTunes the Podcast's episode on Regine Velasquez:

So, What Kind Of Rice?

 In a typical Filipino pantry, you'll find rice. Exactly what kind, you ask?

Long-grain VS. Short-grain

Mainly, we prefer rice that is white as snow, aromatic, and long-grain. It complements the main dishes of meat, poultry or even vegetables. The favorites are Jasmine rice and Milagrosa, and you can tell if the rice grain is fresh just by the strong aroma. If not, you can always add some pandan or screwpine leaves to give the same result.

Pandan leaf aroma is distinct and hard to describe, somewhat nutty, reminiscent to fresh hay and definitely pleasant.

Another favorite is what we call, "malagkit"(pronounced MAH-lag-kit), a short-grain rice that is sticky and starchy when cooked. This goes well for savory dishes like Arroz Caldo and Bringhe and for sweet desserts like Biko, Champorado, Guinataang Monggo and Ginataang Mais. When soaked in water and ground-up, Glutinous rice turns into a type of dough called Galapong. Galapong is used to make Puto, Palitaw, Bibingka.

Making Bibingka - a type of rice cake made of rice flour, coconut milk, egg and water.

Source: Filipino-food-recipes

A Brief History of Rice

"For a Filipino, a meal is not a meal without rice. Besides being the sacrificial cereal for every meal, rice is also ground into flour to make bibingka and puto, pounded flat to make pinipig, and even crushed, dyed and fried to make colorful decorations come fiesta time in Quezon," said Doreen G. Fenandez, a food columnist and researcher.

Rice has become a significant part not only of the Filipino cuisine, but of the culture as well. Without rice in the table, many Pinoys would not even call it a meal. When did rice started being a staple of the Filipino life?

In the Philippines, the cultivation of rice started in the 3200 B.C.  Like of the many southeast Asian countries, rice grown in dry fields was the most common type of rice. Much of this rice was grown by means of the slash-and-burn method of agriculture, and it was glutinous, or sticky rice. It was only in the years after the birth of Christ that wet-field, or irrigated rice cultivation, spread throughout the region.

3200 B.C. proved to be an important point in history for Filipinos - this is when they started to settle in one area as opposed to moving constantly, a typical life of a hunter. The result is that they had more time to develop their culture. Rice made it possible for civilization to appear, not only in the Philippines, but to the whole southeast Asia.

The earliest found archaeological excavation of the use of rice in the Philippines was found at a site called Andarayan. This is a very fertile plain. The sample of rice that archaeologists found is a mix between wild rice and the cultivated rice that we see today. Another find at the site suggests that the people used rice in a variety of ways, as there are clay pots that contain the stems of rice.

Some people disagree that rice is the main staple of our daily consumption, pointing out that sweet potatoes and taro are the legitimate ones. But some scientists find it hard to believe that people would take the time to focus so much of their energy on building terraces if they did not use rice as their main food (as recalled in my previous post.)

Today, rice has to be in every Filipino home, everyday. It is a part of our life, culture, and psyche. Each Pinoy can attest to the fullness and satisfaction of eating rice with every meal. But it doesn't mean we cannot live with all the carbohydrates - many Filipinos working abroad also get used to bread, cheese, couscous, etc. But rice is still our staple food, and for a Pinoy, it's hard to go without it.

 

Source: livingcebuforums

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