Music of the Philippines

The music of the Philippines is a mixture of indigenous, other Asian, European, and American musical sounds. Much of the music of the Philippines have been influenced by the three centuries colonial legacy of Spain; popular rock and roll, hip hop, and pop; the native Austronesian population; and other Asian music.
Traditional music
Main article: Filipino folk music

Kulintang
An example of Pre-hispanic (Islamic) Kulintang musical performers.
Main articles: Kulintang and Agong

Kulintang refers to a racked gong chime instrument played in the southern Philippine Islands, along with its varied accompanying ensembles. Upon the Spanish arrival in the 16th century, Kulintang ensembles (noted as Culintan or Aghon) were the largest, and most advanced Islamic musical instruments of the Muslim Filipinos. Due to hispanization of the majority of the Philippine population; only the Moro ethnic groups of southern Palawan, Mindanao, and the Sulu archipelago retained their Islamic musical tradition.

The Kulintang instrument is also found in other Southeast Asian countries including Borneo, Malaysia, Timor, and Indonesia. These instruments includes the Gong-chime orchestras such as the Gamelan of Java, and Bali, and the Piphat that ensembles the musical instruments of Thailand.
Harana and Kundiman

The Harana or Kundiman is a lyrical song style made popular in the Philippine Islands, which dates back to the Spanish period. Composed in the Mexican-Spanish tradition, the music is characterized by a minor key at the beginning and shifts to a major key in the second half. Its lyrics depict a romantic theme, usually portraying love, passion, or sadness. In other styles of the Harana or Kundiman tradition, the music is based on a love story. Almost all traditional Philippine love songs in this genre are portrayed with poetic emotion.

In the 1920s Harana or Kundiman became a much more mainstream musical style, with many popular performers including Diomedes Maturan, and Ruben Tagalog singing in Harana or Kundiman style.
Cariñosa

The Cariñosa (meaning loving or affectionate one), is a Philippine national dance from the María Clara suite of Philippine folk dances, where the fan, and handkerchief plays an instrument role as it places the couple in romance scenario. The dance is similar to the Jarabe Tapatío. The Cariñosa is accompanied with Hispanic music, and language.
Tinikling

The Tinikling is a Philippine dance which involves two individual performers hitting bamboo poles, using them to beat, tap, and slide on the ground, and against each other in co-ordination with one or more dancers who steps over, and in between poles.
Rondalla

The Rondalla is performed on ensembles comprising mandolin instruments of various sizes called bandurria composed on the Iberian tradition. Other instruments including guitars, is also performed.
Philippine choral music

The Philippine choral music scene has been developed and popularized by the Philippine Madrigal Singers. This choir is the country's premier chorale and has been an award-winning chorale through its existence. It is the only choir in the world to have won twice in the European Grand Prix for Choral Singing (1997, and 2007), widely considered the most prestigious chorale competition in the world. Also from the same homefront, i.e. the University of the Philippines, are the University of the Philippines Singing Ambassadors (or UPSA) and the University of the Philippines Concert Chorus (or UPCC), two of the most sought-after and multi-awarded groups in the country. Also, Kundirana, a high-school choral group from La Salle Green Hills, became popular as well. Other popular and internationally awarded groups are the UST Singers and the Ateneo College Glee Club. Saint Louis University Glee Club in Baguio city has been one of the outstanding choral group in the Philippines and the most rewarded choral group in the Cordilleran Region for winning in the CCP.
OPM (Original Pilipino Music)

Original Pilipino Music, now more commonly termed Original Pinoy Music or Original Philippine Music, (frequently abbreviated to OPM) originally referred only to Philippine pop songs, especially those in the ballad form, such as songs popularized in the 1970s through the mid-1990s by major commercial Philippine pop music artists like Pilita Corrales, Ryan Cayabyab, Kuh Ledesma, Zsa Zsa Padilla, Martin Nievera, Basil Valdez, Rey Valera, Regine Velasquez, Ogie Alcasid, Jamie Rivera, Joey Albert, Sharon Cuneta, Lani Misalucha, Lea Salonga, and APO Hiking Society.

OPM pop has also been regularly showcased in the live band scene. Groups like Neocolors, Side A, True Faith (band), Passage, Freestyle and 3rd Avenue popularized songs that clearly reflect the sentimental character of OPM pop.

In the passage of time as well as the development of many diverse and alternative musical styles in the Philippines, however, the term OPM now refers to any type of Original Philippine Music created in the Philippines or composed by individuals of Philippine extraction, regardless of location at the time when composed. The lyrics, in fact, may be in any language or dialect. Although most of it are written either in Filipino, English, or "Taglish," OPMs written in other non-Philippine languages (e.g., Japanese), though handful, do exist.
Modern Philippine music

For the past 20 years, OPM have been located in Manila, where Tagalog, and English are the dominant languages. Other ethnolinguistic groups such as the Visayan, Bikol, and Kapampangan, despite making music in their native languages are not recognized in the OPM category, except in phenomenal cases like the Bisrock (Visayan Rock) song "Charing" by Davao band 1017.

Multiculturalism advocates, and federalists often connect this to the Tagalog cultural hegemony of the capital city of Manila.

Having successfully created a subgenre of Philippine Rock they called Bisrock, the Visayans by far have the biggest collection of modern music in their native language, with great contributions from Visayan bands Phylum, and Missing Filemon.

Following suit are the Kapampangans. The debut music video of "Oras" by Tarlac City-based Kapampangan band Mernuts has penetrated MTV Pilipinas, making it the first ever Kapampangan music video to join the ranks of other mainstream Filipino music videos. "RocKapampangan: The Birth of Philippine Kapampangan Rock," an album of modern remakes of folk Kapampangan extemporaneous songs by various Kapampangan bands was also launched last February 2008, which are now regularly played via Kapampangan cable channel Infomax-8 and via one of Central Luzon's biggest FM radio stations, GVFM 99.1. Inspired by what the locals call "Kapampangan cultural renaissance," Angeles City-born balladeer Ronnie Liang rendered Kapampangan translations of some of his popular songs such as "Ayli" (Kapampangan version of "Ngiti") and "Ika" (Kapampangan version of "Ikaw") for his repackaged album.

Despite the growing clamor for non-Tagalog, and non-English music, and greater representations of other Philippine languages; the local Philippine music industry, which is located in Manila, is still skeptical in making investments. Some of their major reasons include the language barrier, the still-small market, and the demonization of regionalism in the Philippine Islands.
Philippine rock music

The United States occupied the Islands in 1898 until 1935, and introduced American blues folk music, R&B, and rock and roll became popular. In the late 1950s, native performers adapted Tagalog lyrics for North American rock n'roll music, resulting in the seminal origins of Philippine rock. The most notable achievement in Philippine rock of the 1960s was the hit song "Killer Joe," which propelled the group "Rocky Fellers" which reached number 16 on the American radio charts.

Up until the 1970s, popular rock music began writing and producing in English. In the early 1970s, rock music began to be written using local languages, with bands like the Juan Dela Cruz Band being among the first popular bands to do so. Mixing Tagalog, and English lyrics were also popularly used within the same song, in songs like "Ang Miss Universe Ng Buhay Ko," by the band Hotdogs which helped innovate the Manila sound. The mixing of the two languages (known as "Taglish"), while common in casual speech in the Philippines, was seen as a bold move, but the success of Taglish in popular songs, including Sharon Cuneta's first hit, "Mr DJ," broke the barrier forevermore.

Philippine rock musicians added folk music, and other influences, helping to lead to the 1978 breakthrough success of Freddie Aguilar. Aguilar's Anak, his debut recording, is the most commercially successful philippine recording, and was popular throughout Asia, and Europe, and has been translated into numerous language by singers worldwide. Asin also broke into the music scene at the same period, and were popular.

Folk-rock became the Philippine protest music of the 1980s, and Aguilar's "Bayan Ko" became especially popular as an anthem during the 1986 revolution. At the same time, a counterculture rejected the rise of politically focused lyrics. In Manila, a Punk rock scene developed, led by bands like Betrayed, The Jerks, and Urban Bandits. The influence of New Wave was also felt during these years, spearheaded by The Dawn.

1990s saw the emergence of a superstar pop-rock group, the Eraserheads, considered by many Philippine nationals as the number one group in the Philippine recording scene. In the wake of their success was the emergence of a string of influential Filipino rock bands such as Yano, Siakol, Parokya ni Edgar, and Rivermaya, each of which mixes the influence of a variety of rock subgenres into their style.

Philippine rock has also developed to include some hard rock, heavy metal, and Alternative rock such as Wolfgang, Razorback, Greyhounds, Queso, Grin department and the progressive band Paradigm.

The Neo-Traditional genre in Philippine music is also gaining popularity, with artists such as Joey Ayala, Grace Nono, Bayang Barrios, Cocojam, and Pinikpikan, reaping relative commercial success while utilizing the traditional musical sounds of many indigenous tribes in the country.

Today, the Philippine Islands exhibits western style music, producing notable bands such as PUPIL, Sponge Cola, Callalily, Chicosci, Bamboo, Silent Sanctuary, Rocksteddy, Kjwan, Kamikazee, Cueshe, Itchyworms, Vinyard, Valley of Chrome, Clap Your Hands, Imago, Hale, The Ambassadors, Moonstar 88, Faspitch, Check,and Urbandub, and the emergence of its first virtual band, Mistula
Other genres

A number of other genres are growing in popularity in the Philippine music scene, including a number of alternative groups, and tribal bands promoting cultural awareness of the Philippine Islands.

Also, there is a thriving, and active heavy metal, and hardcore scenes all across the country. Although still mainly in the underground, the emergence of various online organizations, productions and indie labels has been slowly bringing them into popularity as various bands now have their albums on the store shelves of major record bars, and outlets.
(from Wikipedia)