Listeners may have heard a new language in the air Monday at Revelstoke's daily outdoor summer concert: Tagalog.
Popular local singer-songwriter Sadie Baker was scheduled for REVY.Live Outside the evening of Aug. 11, but she ended up welcoming a Revelstoke newcomer, Jyn San Miguel, onstage to share some tunes of his own.
San Miguel, born in the Philippines' Laguna province and raised in Manila, moved to Canada with his family as a teenager. He spent the last seven years in Canmore, Alta., making a name for himself as the "Canadian Balladeer" and working to unite and highlight the Filipino immigrant community he met there.
"I'm one of the pioneers of founding the Filipino community there," he said, noting the town's cultural makeup is as high as eight per cent Filipino. "Canmore has a big concentration."
While Revelstoke's Filipino-Canadian scene hasn't been as "out there" as Canmore's, San Miguel is already thinking about ways to bring the community together, having only moved to town a month ago.
"I guess music is number one in our culture," he joked. "You're doing it not just to play music, but to connect with the audience."
For example, the harana is a common practice in the Philippines where a man visits the home of a woman he admires to serenade her with love songs.
"You sing in front of the house and they look out the window," San Miguel explained. "That's how courting works."
Through his own songwriting, he tries to connect Filipinos with similar experiences and memories from back home. On Monday at REVY.Live Outside, San Miguel performed "Kalesa," a Tagalog-language song about riding a horse carriage down cobbled streets.
"I brought back the audience to the old times in the Philippines," he said, describing people clapping along as the tempo changes to symbolize the carriage speeding up and slowing down.
He also performed "Coconut Nut," about the coconut tree and its agricultural value for the Philippines.
"It's known as the tree of life because it can all be used, from top to bottom," San Miguel said.
He credited the success of his recent gig to good friend Anthony Balaoro, who encouraged Baker to invite San Miguel as a guest performer. For him, it also became a rare, heartwarming moment for Revelstoke's Filipino-Canadian community as a whole.
Many of them labour hard, San Miguel emphasized, balancing multiple jobs as caretakers, cleaners and food workers to send money back overseas to their families. Often, this means they have minimal time for socializing in their community. San Miguel recently took one hard-working friend 鈥� who's spent three years in Revelstoke but doesn't hike, ski, or snowboard 鈥� up Mount Revelstoke for his first time.
"People have to be more friendly with the cultural community because this is not their land," he said, noting it's not always easy for Filipino-Canadians to come out to events.
Yet, when they heard San Miguel was performing, a couple dozen of his Filipino-Canadian friends switched shifts or requested time off work to go watch him. He amplified his gratitude toward fellow Filipinos in a Facebook post Tuesday, Aug. 12.
"To my supportive colocs, thank you for cheering me on, and to my buddy TJ, thanks for helping me put together my outfit," San Miguel wrote. "A big shout-out to Sadie Baker for having me as a guest performer last night. It was an absolute blast, and I鈥檓 so thankful for your support."
Even in Canada, often considered a hub for international diversity, cultural differences can leave Filipinos feeling isolated or misunderstood, San Miguel explained. This includes their tendency to avoid eye contact as a sign of respect, which may confuse other Canadians, or being talked over by locals who speak English more fluently and loudly. He said another contrast is that more stigma exists in the Philippines around talking about mental health, which he's tried to help break for Filipino-Canadians in Canmore.
It's been nearly four months since the Lapu-Lapu Day tragedy in Vancouver on April 26, which San Miguel was lined up to volunteer at but chose not to at the last minute.
"When I heard the news, I had the shivers because I could've been there," he said, noting some of his Filipino-Canadian friends lost loved ones or others they knew. "It's horrifying."
San Miguel supported a fundraiser in the event's aftermath, playing songs for Vancouver's Filipino community to console and raise funds for victims' families.
"It's more than money," he noted, stressing the importance of building resilience for Filipino-Canadians. "It's about helping people in a time of darkness."
Now 36, San Miguel is currently working on his memoir-manifesto, "Millennial Kindness," and expects to organize his own local concert, featuring other Revelstoke artists, in step with the book's release.
"The Tagalog songs won't go away," he said, adding that he continues to mix up his wide-ranging musical style and is currently experimenting with French and Italian numbers.
As well, San Miguel said food can bridge a huge social gap for local Filipino-Canadians, who back in the Philippines grow up loving to share their meals in public spaces. Kamayan, the practice of eating by hand rather than by utensil, is also an occasion for friends and family to roll out a communal feast on a bed of banana leaves.
San Miguel hopes other Revelstokians can open their hearts to this kind of meal sharing, as one way to connect with local Filipino-Canadians and make them feel welcomed.
"I think that's going to be, not the solution, but how we're going to make a better community here."
