Bayani Mendoza De Leon ‘59
November 24, 1942 - September 14, 2013
Bayani Mendoza de Leon, a composer, who distinguished himself as a multi-instrumentalist, arranger, conductor, poet, writer, ethnomusicologist and cultural scholar, died on September 14, 2013 in Las Pinas City from complications of a stroke. He was 70 years old and lived in Las Pinas, where he moved to last year after more than 35 years of living in the U.S. Bayani was born on November 24, 1942 in Manila. He is the son of composer and Philippine National Artist Felipe Padilla de Leon and concert pianist Iluminada Mendoza. Bayani is survived by his wife, the poet Rhodora V. Penaranda, his four children Lakasnubay (New Jersey, USA), Sarighani (Nashville, Tennessee, USA) Okir and Amihan, his three grandchildren Nadia, Leila, Tyler, his first wife, concert pianist Cynthia Guerrero de Leon, and his siblings Felipe, Jr., Tagumpay, Magdangal, and Marilag.
In 1964, my good friend Bayani asked me to stay with him in his parents’ house in Cubao, Quezon City to work on a project sponsored by the Concert Philippines, Inc. Weeks and months had gone by so fast we hardly realized we lived under the same roof for almost one and a half years. I returned to my house in Domingo Ampil, Sta. Mesa in 1965. I did not see him again until the day I migrated to the USA in 1967.
A faculty professor in the theory and composition Department of the University of the Philippines College of Music, Bayani left in 1979 for San Diego, California, USA under the Fulbright-Hays Scholarship Grant. We did not hear from each other up until 1985 when we had our first Mapa reunion in Baltimore, Maryland. A couple of years later, during the Mapa USA & Canada Midwest Chapter alumni reunion in Chicago in 1987, Bayani and I were together again. He came to my house to see my daughter his god-daughter. Alhtough the visit was brief, within an hour he harmonized and wrote the entire music score of the “Sweetheart” the first song I wrote in 1974. In 1991, I learned that he married my cousin Rhodora. In all these years whether we saw each other or not, I cannot recall my good friend Bayani ever disappeared in my eyes, or I ever missed him because he seemed to be everywhere, everytime.
Bayani is an all-around musician who can play with virtuosity almost all kinds of musical instruments. When he was not composing, playing the piano, the guitar, violin, flute, accordion, saxophone, trumpet, or other musical instruments, I would find him reading and analyzing great and famous literary works. I wonder if he ever went to bed. With the way he was leading his young life, I thought he was already competing with the gods. He became proficient in both Music and Literature in a little over two years (other than the years in high school), and mastered the karate, taekwondo and tai chi in 3 months. Bayani worked all his life on disciplining both his mind and body, consistently applying the concept of “mind over matter” in his daily life and in his pursuit for perfection. I distinctly remember one freezing night in Chicago when on our way to a bowling place my car broke down. The temperature outside was 5 below zero plus a windshield factor of 25. I was wearing thick warm mittens and was heavily wrapped from head to foot. He was wearing a very light jacket. For an ordinary person who just came from a warm place like San Diego, there was no way he could have survived the unkind weather in Chicago. .He opened the hood of the car to get into the bottom of the problem . While he was working on the ignition with his bare hands, I would go back and forth inside a restaurant nearby to order some coffee and to revive my frozen fingers. By the time the coffee was ready for pick up, he had the car up and running again. He followed me inside the restaurant . My hands were still frozen. I almost dropped the cup when the vendor handed it to me. Bayani had grabbed the cup and held it for me. I took the cup from him and felt his hand. It was warm.
Bayani earned his Bachelor of Philosophy in the University of Santo Tomas, and his Bachelor of Music, major in composition, in the University of the Philippines. He received his Master of Arts in Music from the University of California, and was a recipient of scholarship grant in music composition from the Music Promotion Foundation of the Philippines. He was nominated to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1980. He produced several music and literary compositions; some of them were commissioned by prestigious institutions. He was a music director, and arranged several musical compositions. He was a lecturer, Economic Information writer, consultant, literary editor, Editor-in-Chief, official delegate to various cultural conventions around the world including Middle East, Europe, America and Mexico. He was a Chairman of various organizations and committees, and was a recipient of various major awards including the Palanca Award. He was regarded one of the top traditional and modern composers and cultural leaders in the Philippines. He was an associate member of the League of Filipino Composers who received regular commissions from the Philippine National Government. He is the author of "Baybayin” a Concise Manual of the Ancient Script of the Philippines. He is a recipient of the 2008 Pamana ng Pilipino Presidential Award, and is the Mapa High School Alumni Blue Falcon Awardee in 2009.
Bayani’s overriding desire to identify himself with community needs and aspirations led him to apply his dynamic energy to the development of young artists here and abroad. The American composer John Cage, with whom he shared both musical and philosophical ideas, once said of Bayani, “if you have a question on any topic of a spiritual nature, this man can answer it.” Bayani taught both yoga and tai chi for many years, and generously shared his expertise in the healing arts. In 1975, he founded the first Gurdjieff society in the Philippines. He served as mentor to many aspiring musicians and artists from different disciplines, sharing the spiritual content of what he taught, always instilling this most important internal aspect in his students.
The influence of Bayani, who was also a master martial artist and teacher, spread throughout the Philippine-American community as a culture bearer in raising awareness and appreciation of traditional and contemporary Philippine music and arts in the US.
In a musical career that began in the 1960s, Bayani composed many versatile works, ranging from operas, symphonies, art songs to avant-garde pieces scored in the most unconventional formats. By 1971 he had become a distinguished member of the League of Filipino Composers. In 1979 he went to the US as a Fulbright-Hays scholar in music and studied avant-garde music composition at the University of California, San Diego, where he received his Master of Arts. He is listed in Grove’s International Dictionary of Music and Musicians.
"Music is the highest manifestation of the sacred word," he told an interviewer." Its tremendous power lies in affecting the vibrational state of one’s being in a positive way.” Among his many accomplishments, he has composed deeply esoteric works that successfully interpret traditional folk music from the Philippines and made it accessible for an entirely new global audience.
Among his seminal works are Batong-Buhay for rondalla,Bantay-Bata, which combined Philippine indigenous instruments with the Western harp and clarinet, Mga Sugatang Perlas, a music-dance play, and two contemporary ballets Atlantis and Anting-Anting. He has also composed several hundred musical arrangements of Philippine folk and indigenous music, standard classical repertoire, Broadway and opera tunes and world music for band, rondalla, guitar and choral groups.
Outside of his musical career, Bayani earned recognition as both writer and editor. He had worked at the National Media Production Center where he was the vernacular section chief, and editor of "Pag-asa", a government-published magazine. In 1965 he was the recipient of the Palanca Award for his short story, "Mga Luha Ni Lela.” He ended his 25-year career as an editor for the publishing giant Simon & Schuster / Prentice Hall Publishing as Managing Editor, Higher Division, of Pearson Education Publishing in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.
In his entire life, Bayani made music and literature his great and extraordinary choices of which we are all the beneficiaries. They will inspire us; he will be in our hearts forever.
To find Bayani’s other works, visit his website - menageriearts.web.com
Ciriaco Jun Villasin ’59
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