HUMANFOLK[3] is the musical collaboration and concept band of guitarist-composer Johnny Alegre with the New York City–based Fil-Am percussionist Susie Ibarra[4] and her husband, drummer Roberto Juan Rodriguez, together with the multi-instrumentalist Cynthia Alexander and the electronica exponent Malek Lopez. This collective is a pioneering effort marking the convergence in a contemporary Philippine setting of multiple musical idioms (jazz, rock, electronic music, kulintang, agung and indigenous percussion, with Iberian and folk music influences). The group's name is a deliberate conjoining of the words "human" and "folk", akin to "menfolk" and "womenfolk", without prejudice to gender and frequently set in all caps to distinguish it from a dictionary term.
History
The band started as a collaboration of musicians in the summer of 2008.[5] The introduction of Alegre, Ibarra and Rodriguez at the United States Embassy in Manila spurred a series of musical and social interactions. The impetus culminated in the recording sessions for the "Humanfolk Suite", a world music cycle composed by Alegre, for which Alexander and Lopez completed the HUMANFOLK quintet.
Towards October 2008, the threesome of Alegre, Alexander, and Lopez performed a live semi-improvised score for a short, silent film by Sasha Palomares, entitled Une Femme Andalouse, which was awarded the KODAK Best 16mm Experimental Film in that year by the Kodak Filmschool Competition. They were subsequently invited to perform at the 4th Philippine International Jazz & Arts Festival in February 2009, and a live collaborative performance with the Australian didgeridoo virtuoso William Barton in January 2010, that also introduced vocalist-keyboardist Abby Clutario as a new principal member of the group. These appearances and many others that followed led to the release by MCA Music (Universal Music Group) of Humanfolk's eponymous album in May 2011.[6][7]
In 2012, Humanfolk was conferred an Awit Award for the song "Para Sa Tao", as Best World Music Recording by the Philippine Association of the Record Industry (PARI).[8] Upon the exodus of two founding members, Cynthia Alexander[9] (for the United States) and Malek Lopez (for Singapore), Alegre and Clutario have continued as Humanfolk's principal members in a configuration described as Mark II, which was introduced in 2013 before international audiences in Singapore's Mosaic Music Festival and Malaysia's Kota Kinabalu Jazz Festival.[1] In the Philippines, the group performed at the 2nd CCP International Jazz Festival in September 2013,[5][10][11] and recorded the promotional EP, Ephipany. In January 2015, the group performed in India at the Saarang International Cultural Festival[12] organized by IIT Madras. Towards the end of 2015, the group was joined by vocalist and rhythm guitarist Kris Gorra Dancel;[13] and session percussionist Deej Rodriguez. This expanded group, described as Mark III, recorded the year-end extended playNaglalarong Ilaw, an independent release.
As a fitting counterpoint to HUMANFOLK's performance in November 2010 when they were launched at the Ayala Museum[14][15] — the music of HUMANFOLK was once again presented in a 2-hour Ayala Museum retrospective concert in November 2023, entitled "Indigenous Legacies"[16] hosted by the Filipinas Heritage Library.[17][18]
