Happy 80th birthday to Manlilikha ng Bayan Alonzo Saclag! (August 4, 1942)
Alonzo Saclag
Musician and Dancer
Kalinga
Lubuagan, Kalinga
Alonzo Saclag is a Kalinga master of dance and the performing arts, he has made it his mission to create and nurture a greater consciousness and appreciation of Kalinga culture, among the Kalinga themselves and beyond their borders. As a young boy in Lubugan, Alonzo Saclag found endless fascination in the sights and sounds of day-to-day village life and ritual. According to his son, he received no instructions, formal or otherwise, in the performing arts. Yet he mastered not only the Kalinga musical instruments but also the dance patterns and movements associated with his people’s rituals.
To guarantee that his knowledge in the performing arts is passed on to others, he formed the Kalinga Budong Dance Troupe. He takes the young men and women who come to him under his charge and they learn about the music and dance of their ancestors. While many expressed a genuine desire to represent and promote Kalinga performing arts, he admits that a handful has other, more personal motives. Because the troupe occasionally goes on tour, joining it is perceived by some as a chance to see places other than the mountains they call home.
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