A: I’m Angelo Pizzarro. Full name is Nichasho Angelo Velasco Pizarro. And being surrounded by music when I was young I developed…kind of distorting…
Oh, I see.
I’m Angelo Velasco Pizzrro and I started at a very young age, surrounded by music. Music all over the house, my cousins, my brothers all playing instruments. And my cousin got me enrolled in a junior high school and that school they didn’t have saxophone. I was going to play sax like my father. But the principal said they had a guitar class. So I said okay. My brother played the guitar by ear, without sheet music. So at the high school they provided instruments and they gave each student a guitar classical instrument. That’s how I got started, summer of 70…
My father taught me a song called Naranja Bullon, which means bright moon, and I guess I should play a little bit of it.
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I messed up, I’m kind of nervous.
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Oh, this is going to take a long time….
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Are you ready Scott? Maybe I’ll play the other piece he showed me how to play. Maybe I’ll do little pieces I’ve collected. Some of them don’t have names, they’re just reflecting back to what he used to play. Because he was also a town DJ when I was growing up in the Philippines and he played all kinds of music. Some of them are very sad, some of them are very wild.
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Hello, Dmae?
Well, I kind of put my own style right now. Pretty much around maybe 14, 15. basically it was simple then. Like…PLAYS Then I just added more to it.
Back in the Philippines I was born in Santa Maria Luzon. South of Manila I think, south of Manila. That place, it was fun growing up there, there’s the plaza where they have sometimes the fiesta right there. Sometimes they use the plaza for tennis games. I was a tennis player and when I got here I worked up from the bottom to winning the championship in Chartis high school. He’d play in the plaza all kinds of music. Him being a DJ he’d play all kinds. And he’d travel from Seattle to Birmingham to buy a record, a 45 or 33 1/3, take that far to buy something.
I’ll record that song anyway. The very, very first song I learned it in the saxophone too. My father also played the saxophone. Summer of 70 right around July and that time…
Right, and my father was already here though with his brother and my other relatives. And when we got here they helped me out, my cousin , she got me a job at the University of Washington as a file clerk and that was my first job. So when she goes to school she picks me up and I go right at my filing. One of the libraries. No, I’m not. I work at the United States postal service. And yes, I’ve been there for 20 years.
This one, the last one I ended up with, this one is called ‘my true love’ and that one way back.
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Oh, gosh. It’s one of those, I don’t know, 50s. 40s. there’s a lot of those old ones. Some of them I can’t remember. Some of them I know part of it. Yeah, very old. Maybe older, maybe 1920s. they played like when they do the jarana it’s a serenade and they play the demon and that’s kind of feeling. Serenade, that’s when a man go and serenade a woman at her home. I don’t know how far back but I went to the internet one time and they were playing that collection of oldies and that’s one of them. It’s called ‘my true love’.
It was just, I think you just heard 10, 15 seconds of it.
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Yes, things like those they have a lot of music like that.
Manila men? Right. I heard stories about Nat Foley. Okay, yeah, yeah.
Let’s see, what comes to mind? I have an image to it but, I guess they’d be like dancing. We can do like actually goes back more. It’s called the Tinnecle. Maybe they started that. I’m looking at my wife, she knows all that. It’s like the famous folk dance music back in the Philippines. Yeah. Let me see.
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Part of it is like that. No, the other ones I don’t know. Sometimes when I listen to that I pick up the parts catchy to my ears.
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Thank you. That’s like the slow part of it because the other part is a fast one and sometimes I know when I remember the melody. Sure, okay. The sampageda one. Sampageda is the name of a flower, a white flower. What is it? Philippine national flower, but it’s white. It’s called sampegeda. Sampageda is the Philippine national flower and that’s what it is. they call the song sampageda and you’ll hear the melody, I’ll play a little bit.
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Wish I knew all the very old. This one’s very old. Early 1900s. growing up in the Philippines he played the saxophone. He would play music for the dance, people who would do folk dancing he would do it live. And I was amazed when he writes the mus ic out of his head and play it back. That thing I cannot do. and he brought me to every barrios in the town to do their functions, their special events, and a lot of caleza ridding, it’s a horse-powered wagon to every barrio we went to. And he came here first to the US before we did, maybe 5 years before. And he used to play at Pioneer square with my uncle and I don’t know how much they got paid but pretty much then. And after that he form a band, Pizarro band, with my cousins, my brothers, and that’s where I started playing the tambourine. I guess they didn’t trust me with the guitar yet. Four brothers. Yes, all of them played drums and sang. The next one older than me played the bass and guitar and piano and he was the one I was amazed from, learning the songs from the record without any music. Just learning it by ear. It’s a musical family. No, I think there’s a lot of families that have one like that. No, he work at a Swedish hospital as maintenance. Yes. They played like a rondolia type. I guess that’ show I learned that sound. It’s like tremolo picking. PLAYS. Like that. So I like that part so I try to keep that. That’s my Filipino root. Well, it’s a see, Filipinos are influenced by Spanish too so they’re like together. Yeah,. Because flamenco is a bit more…it’s pretty close because sometimes they think I’m playing flamenco when I’m playing Filipino. It’s so close to the Spanish. As far as playing, flamenco is more like….PLAYS . but Filipino is more melodic. PLAYS It’s like, they started with the Harana, the cundemon songs.
Lively music? Yeah, they play a lot of minor and then change to major. Oh, yeah, I can do that. Let me just do folk dance music.
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That was a three quarter tempo. Os they would dance between the sticks on that one, between the poles. That’s where they try to not get their ankles caught. You get used to it. Tenacling is the name of that dance. In fact, I danced that dance before. Yes, I was in a berungi family group and we go all over town just to perform. That’s when I was younger.
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But it’s a slow one. It’s another slow one, it’s pretty much the same.
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What do you mean? Oh, okay.
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Let’s see. I have to start thinking. I guess I’ll start with the intense one.
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I stopped kind of in the middle. I remember that song I played it. It was a hot summer time and I just started playing a bit of that and extended it. Yeah, it was for KING 5 news one time. That was a little bit more. For one minute? Well. Let me see.
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Yeah, that was one minute I guess. Lets see. Pretty much like…
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Let me start again.
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Thank you. Yes, actually. Oh, you mean just for recording? That’s even more scarier. Oh, okay.
Right now I’m into different things. Right now I’m getting ready for this one competition called Guitarmegeddon and right now I’m playing a lot of blues. I guess I have to defend my title. The last two years I’ve won the district and I have to defend it. Their title is king of the blues. But I really don’t have one goal. There are so many things. Whatever makes me feel good, I guess.
I play those things where I play and they seem to like it more than when I’m playing just jazz. PLAYS And they seem to like when I play the Filipino more than the jazz tunes. Oh, I don’t think so. I think the only Filipinos who know about it is the pop songs, the current songs, that’s what they probably know. Sang by popular artists back in the Philippines. That would be the only one. Only from the Filipinos. They seem to do it and I hopefully I’ll record a whole bunch of those. I have to learn some more. I do know a lot but I have to get all the parts down. And working on how to record it and how would I want to do it. I would do it like a solo piece. And I would try to do it differently from what they had to make it more interesting.
I’ll try to finish the songs I kept messing up on. Okay, I’ll try to do it.
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Pretty much like that. Oh, okay. It’s the one called Naranja Nabula. I don’t know why I keep messing up. It’s the first one that my father used to play a lot.
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There you go!
Just like I try to feel the song. Actually the first one I was playing, I use this like a test, testing the sound of the venue that I’m going to be playing. PLAYS Things like that.
That sounds good. Right. We’ll see. I love challenges. Sure. Nice to meet you, Dmae. Same here. Thank you.