Filipino Songs in a Classical Mood

[sts5]

Hi! I was wondering if anyone could help me identify the piano pieces that were used/quoted in the following Filipino Songs arranged by Raul Sunico. (The album actually contains different Filipino songs arranged in the style/setting of famous piano pieces like Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata and Rachmaninoff's Prelude, among others). Thanks!

Dahil Sa'yo: https://www.deezer.com/track/76294703

Saan ka Man Naroroon: https://www.deezer.com/track/76294704

[huaidongxi]

hello, it appears that 'deezer' is not accessible from the u.s.a. ; are the songs on any of the Sunico youtube segments, and if they are, which ones ?

[sts5]

Hi! Thanks for replying! I can't find any youtube video of him performing the said pieces. I took the liberty of attaching herein the mp3 files for reference purposes only.Thanks again for the help!

[huaidongxi]

kind of you to format the pieces to permit me to audit them.  there's a genre of short romantic pieces, often performed as encores, popular in the late romantic period(richard strauss, rachmaninov, mahler, just for chronological reference, their compositions don't resemble these two songs), but don't know those encore pieces, sometimes called 'bon-bons'(small confections) at all, and those that come to mind are not like these two Sunico compositions. there is a ton of stuff from operettas and light opera, regular opera as well that is outside my experience. no offense, but my instincts tell me that these songs come from a popular music tradition, not art ("classical") music tradition.  they seem very much influenced by what's known as 'the great american songbook', which is really an unruly steamer trunk of songs from tin pan alley, vaudeville, stage musicals, and film soundtracks, and one of the principal sources of what is termed 'jazz standards'.  the arrangements on these two tunes remind me very much of the way jazz ballads are put together.

there's a well known standard ballad that you might listen to, and perhaps hear its similarity to Sunico's style in these two pieces.  the original lyrics were Spanish, written for a Mexican popular song titled, "Cuando vuelva a Tu Lado", though the english versions which became hits for several singers were called, "What a difference a day makes".  two of the best renditions are by Dinah Washington (probably the most iconic), and an instrumental interpretation by the Argentine tenor saxophonist, Gato Barbieri, with a lot of its original hispanic character.

most of the folks here on the piano forum are more knowledgeable and musicologically trained than me (pianistically, virtually everyone), hope your curiosity gets satisfied.  peace

[sts5]

Thanks for the reply! I just thought that all the entries from his album may have references to classical pieces. Attached herein are two of the arrangements I first heard on deezer, both of which referenced famous Beethoven pieces. Other arrangements of his (in his other album in deezer) referenced Bach's Prelude in C Major and Liszt's Consolation. I guess it was my mistake to assume that the same would apply to the rest of his arrangements from the same album. Thanks anyway! 

[huaidongxi]

liszt wrote a huge number of song arrangements, paraphrases, transcriptions from both small and large musical works composed by others, and he's from that romantic/late romantic genre that sunico reminds me of. other virtuosic pianist/composers of the late 19th/early 20th century (the beginning of modernism in science and literature, mainstream art music mostly reactionary although jazz was well on its way), like godowsky, paderewsky, wrote similar stuff, just not familiar with much of it. not trained in 'classical' musicology at all, me.