As a touring ensemble of just twelve dancers when it began in 1995, Ballet Manila traveled all over the Philippines in its first year in keeping with its mission to “bring ballet to the people.” One of its destinations that December was Zamboanga where they staged Ballet Manila Dances, featuring a program of classical numbers and Filipino choreographies. 

The show had come about upon the invitation of La Asociacion Musical de Zamboanga, a group aiming to educate and expose the people of Zamboanga to the different forms of culture and the arts. Ballet Manila Dances was apparently the first classical ballet performance held in Zamboanga in more than 25 years. 

The night’s program included classical fare such as: Pas de Trois from Paquita, pure classical dancing for three, laden with Spanish bravura flavor; Pas d’Esclave from Le Corsaire, a pas de deux of Gulnara and the slave trader Lankadem; Pas de Trois from Le Corsaire, with three ballerinas each dancing a variation showing off a different quality and technique; and Don Quixote Pas de Deux, the wedding dance of Kitri and Basilio, highlighting the technique and artistry of principal dancers Lisa Macuja and Osias Barroso.

The Filipino pieces, meanwhile, included: Ianne Damian’s Mosquerade, a stylized interpretation of the traditional Muslim wedding dance; Manuel Molina’s Mirror, Romance and Fame, a neo-classic interpretation of two dancers’ fates as they progress from self-adulation to mutual affection and finally to fame; Jojo Lucila’s Southroad, with girls and boys sharing the joy and merrymaking of a town fiesta as inspired by a yearly celebration in rural Bicol; and Eric V. Cruz’s Panaginip, a romantic adagio involving a man’s search for his ideal love.

What was quite remarkable about Ballet Manila Dances was the stage used for the performance held at the Garden Orchid Convention Center. As Lisa Macuja described it in her column in Malaya then: “The dancing was done on a stage made up of more than a thousand stacked Coca-Cola cases. Two trucks were needed to bring in the empty cases of Coke litro. The ‘impromptu’ stage was very sturdy with just the right bounce and has presented to us a permanent solution to provincial venues that do not have the proper stage size or hollow base that classical dancers need in order to perform.”