Janine Liao

Cover photo: Secretary General Ivan Henares, and Aaron Veloso from the UNESCO Philippine National Commission pose with the Certificates of Inscription for the Hinilawod Epic Chant Recordings and the Doctrina Christiana in Spanish and Tagalog, Photo courtesy of Sec. Gen. Henares.


ULAANBAATAR, MONGOLIA, 8 May 2024 – The 10th Memory of the World Regional Committee for Asia and the Pacific (MOWCAP) General Meeting in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, inducts two nominees from the Philippines into the regional registry – the Doctrina Christiana en Lengua Española y Tagala and the Hinilawod Epic Chant Recordings. This marks the first time for the Philippines to have its nominees inscribed in the regional registry of the Memory of the World.

The Hinilawod Epic Chant Recordings are part of the F. Landa Jocano collection which were digitized and curated by the University of the Philippines Center for Ethnomusicology (UPCE). Of the 22 open tape reels, 19 are recordings of the Hinilawod, totaling a running time of 35 hours and 32 minutes.

The F. Landa Jocano reels were received in 2013. Shown in the photo is one of the 22 open reel tapes of the collection, with signs of mold. The UP Center for Ethnomusicology Audio Conservation Laboratory prepared and processed the reels so that they can be safely digitized.

Together with the tireless efforts of the UNESCO Philippine National Commission (PH-UNACOM), Prof. Felipe Jocano, Jr., the UP Center for Ethnomusicology, Henry Luce III Library and Archives of the Central Philippine University, and the Panay Bukidnon community, a spot in the regional registry was successfully secured through the voting of the committee members. This recognition puts the Hinilawod Epic Chant in Grade I Level of the National Cultural Heritage Act thus giving it priority for its protection, preservation, and promulgation.

The UP Center for Ethnomusicology is proud to now have in its archive collections that are inscribed in both the UNESCO Memory of the World Regional and Memory of the World International registries. We celebrate with the rest of the Filipino people in honoring our Panay Bukidnon brothers, and in honoring the work of anthropologist F. Landa Jocano.

Roan Opiso, Collections Manager of the UPCE Archive introduces the Jocano reels during the 3rd Regular Meeting of the National Memory of the World Committee, under the Philippine National Commission for UNESCO (also known as PH NatCom or UNACOM) at the UP Center for Ethnomusicology Library last 30 August 2023.

Aside from the F. Landa Jocano recordings, the UPCE archives also keeps selected collections of music scholars including Elena R. Mirano, Ramon P. Santos, Felipe de Leon Sr. and Alicia Magos.

An excerpt from the Hinilawod Epic Recordings collected on the field by Dr. F. Landa Jocano.


Access to these digitized collections can be done by request. Please email upethno.archive.upd@up.edu.ph to inquire or visit our website at www.upethnom.com and follow us on our social media pages, @upethnom, on Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, and Twitter.

Janine Liao is the Educational Dissemination Manager of the UPCE, and also a lecturer from the UP College of Music. Her research interests include popular music, traditional kulintang music, meanings and functions of music in the social sphere, and music theory and analysis. When not working on more academic things, she is a cat mom and a kitchen hero who actively volunteers for church ministry.

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