Monday, March 2, 2015

Tagum Mayor calls for aggressive tourism promotion amidst ASEAN integration



TAGUM CITY, Davao del Norte, Mar 02 (PIA)--- Tagum City Mayor Allan Rellon Saturday opened the Musikahan Festival  with his call for aggressive promotion of  the city’s tourism industry as the country opens its doors to ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nation) Integration.

He called on local prime-movers of  the city’s tourism industry to move ahead and not wait for the national government to  promote “our place and (our) festivals as tourism destination.”

“We must initiate aggressive campaign to forefront our local tourism industry especially to international market,” he said in his Musikahan Festival opening remarks Saturday, during which he unveiled the musical note marker to signal the start of the trio-event to unfold this week in Tagum City.

Aside from  the Musikahan Festival,  the City of Tagum will also be celebrating its 17th Founding Anniversary and will be staging Tagumenyo Bisa’g Asa which is a celebration of “successful and united Tagumenyos worldwide”.

Rellon revealed that efforts to position Tagum as the music capital of the south and the city of festivals “has gained international recognition and appreciation” leading the city to foster sisterhood relations with  Vermont  of the United States through exchanges in music and arts.

“This will be a promising future venture to boost our local tourism industry,” he said.

He also expected  the city of Tagum to draw international attention in 2016  as it  is being considered to host the International Brass Band Competition next year.

Meanwhile,  Rellon aired his call  for Tagumenyos to continue creating festivities to hand down to the next generation the tradition of celebrating success, culture, joy and happiness.



Bringing the involvement of children and youth  at the forefront  of  this year’s Musikahan Festival, the organizers will feature the hundred voices concert of the city’s local choral groups  which are both school and community-based.

Another significant feature  of the Musikahan is the string instrument concert which will  bring together, for the first time, all graduates of the Music Makers Program to render a series of special musical rendition.

“We call it a reunion of music maker graduates in one concert,” Rellon said.

Rellon  also revealed  that innovations were made in holding some of the Musikahan competitions and that  new ones were introduced to go with the trend  in music competitions  and to level up to international standards.

He was confident of the achievement of such objectives  with the guidance  and mentorship Maestro Arnel Feliciano, a national icon of the National Cultural Commission for the Arts and President of the Pambasang Samahan Ng Mga Banda ng Pilipinas (PASAMBAP).   (PIA XI/ Jeanevive Duron-Abangan)

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