Music won’t stop for retired Paoay teacher

MIGUEL Valdez, Hannah Ambrocio and Rocky Rico stand proud outside St. Augustine Church in Paoay, Ilocos Norte, where they perform and teach music to children. LEILANIE ADRIANO/INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON

PAOAY, Ilocos Norte – Children are gathering outside the century-old St. Augustine Church this Christmas week to listen to a 74-year-old retired musician.

Miguel Valdez plays a set of musical instruments that appear old and worn-out, but which he said plays beautifully for village children who love music but could not afford to enroll in a music school or buy their own guitars.

Yuletide visitors, who wander near the picturesque Paoay church, have been stumbling into Valdez’s little group of children who perform Christmas tunes with the old man.

They usually catch Valdez playing his guitar outside the church. But he always keeps handy a set of drums, a piano and an amplifier operating on rechargeable batteries, which are cradled inside the sidecar of a kurong-kurong (a vintage motorcycle).

When asked by a child for a lesson, Valdez readily gives this out for free. He says it makes retirement fulfilling.

“I train them and help them discover their hidden talents. It is for free. It’s my gift to them this Christmas,” he says.

Valdez belongs to a family of musicians. He taught music in various Ilocos Norte schools, retiring finally from a teaching stint at Mariano Marcos State University’s defunct Institute of Arts and Design.

But he never stopped teaching. Valdez has made public places his new classroom, to make sure his legacy of music reaches a wider and much younger audience.

“I hope that [the children] will apply whatever they learned [from me]. Music may become their additional source of income in the future. They can perform during baptismal rites, weddings, or coronation nights,” Valdez says.

“It is my joy to see them perform and make their parents happy that at a young age, they can already help earn money through music.”

Occasionally, he says, tourists offer to buy the children snacks as they listen to them play.

Valdez has been bringing along his 10-year-old nephew, Rocky Rico, who plays drums. “Hearing the duo play their instruments on a Sunday morning at the century-old Paoay church makes our visit more fun in Paoay,” said a tourist during one of Valdez’s sessions on December 22.