These lyrics of a Jackson Browne’s classic, “The Pretender” penetrates deeply, as its prose will always ring true. “Caught between the longing for love and the struggle for the legal tender…” Therein lies a biting pain which aptly describes every struggling artists’ contradictory yearnings: choosing between the pursuance of their art and on the other, heeding the call of steady employment to financially support oneself and the family.
While it may be a rarity to be equally-successful at both, many prosperous artists will not readily agree. It’s a hit-or-miss situation and with so many factors in play, there’s no scientific solution at all to it, only luck. The internal battle as to what should take first priority is indeed very real, especially among the struggling ones. And if this situation where artists constantly find themselves in had been a market commodity, It would surely come with the usual warning and disclaimer: results may vary.
In the limited time I have known him, from the early days at Horizon up to the present, his struggle, along with the rest of us, had been as true to the template from where, all both artisans and artists throughout the ages, had been hewn from.
From seeing him for the first time as the youthful lead guitarist front man in one of Davao’s best ever rock bands during the 70s-80s, who could play his Fender Stratocaster with his teeth or behind his head, to that smooth sessionista and musician for the Davao and Manila music scene’s local heroes, up to being that Maldives troubadour triumphant on his way home, Pio for many, had been the ultimate music man.
If I could briefly describe him in a few words, it would aptly be, ‘always in search for that perfect jam’. Just the same, his three words for me, be they in emails, text messages or in person, had always been the same: “Jam ta Coy?” , as if jamming were cure for a sweet tooth. Why, he even had millennials and budding guitarists, which included some of my nephews, as among his avid fans. Yet in spite all that, it was sad that up till the end, health issues and the fight to make ends meet, have both proven to be the daily windmills for this journeyman and bluesman.
Like so many of our artist friends who have gone ahead, my memory of him will always have special meaning, as though asterisked in my mind to indicate there’s a worthy footnote. Even though we who remain, may manage to achieve a semblance of mastery at our craft and skills, we can never be adept and become masters at saying goodbye and moving on. While for us, the struggle continues, you and many others are finally free of “being caught between the longing for love and the legal tender. Jam ta puhon, Pio.
