Hugot in Lea’s post-Valentine show

MANILA, Philippines - No one looked for a lavish stage décor or a larger-than-life backdrop in Lea Salonga’s post-Valentine’s concert at the PICC. The stage was devoid of any high-tech contraption. Photos and images constantly simply flashed on a giant digital screen

The ABS-CBN Philharmonic Orchestra pretty much occupied the entire stage area, with Gerard Salonga, Lea’s brother and musical director-conductor of the show standing in the center, to make sure every beat was in order.

As soon as Lea sauntered onstage in her Rajo Laurel black outfit, she powerfully opened the concert with Beautiful, from the Carole King musical. Her voice itself was larger than life and that started the night laden with wonderful musical suites.

Guest performer is Jett Pangan, a singer who ‘sings in the key of stratosphere,’ as Lea introduces him

“There’s so much theater music, it’s gonna come out of your ears,” Lea smilingly warned her full-house crowd that “very chaotic Friday” night.

Then she segued into a medley of well-loved tunes by Burt Bacharach and Hal David — I Say a Little Prayer for You, Arthur’s Theme, Don’t Make Me Over, Close To You and What the World Needs Now.

Lea went on to regale the crowd with more heart-warming yet powerful numbers — The Human Heart from Once On This Island, Meadowlark from The Baker’s Wife, She Used To Be Mine from Sara Bareilles’ Waitress and Stephen Sondheim’s So Many People/Loving You from Passion and Broadway Baby from another Sondheim work, Follies, something which will perhaps allow Lea to “genuflect” in awe of his work.

She launched into hugot numbers and went upbeat that got the audience stomping, clapping and grooving with Never Can Say Goodbye from Disaster, If I Can’t Have You from Saturday Night Fever, I Will Survive from Priscilla, Queen of the Desert and Xanadu.

A surprise treat for the audience that night was Lea’s daughter, Nicole Chien, who sang a duet with her, the heart-tugging Pure Imagination from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Then, a visibly nervous but confidently brave Nicole rendered her spot number, Ring of Keys from Fun Home, that allowed Lea for a quick change of outfit.

The kid is clearly a chip off the old block. Nicole performed with Lea on TV before, when the latter marked her special birthday celebration on ABS-CBN’s talent show, The Voice, where she is one of the coaches.

One of Lea’s erstwhile talents in The Voice Kids is Esang de Torres, who is making a name for herself in musical theater. Last year, young Esang essayed the role of Eponine in Les Miserablés, staged both in Manila and Singapore.

Esang joined the production number of other young talents onstage — Krystal Brimner from Annie, Andee Achacoso from Fun Home and seven-year-old Wayneheart Claire Geonzon from The Voice Kids — as guests of the concert. They rendered, quite aptly, When I Get My Name in Lights from The Boy from Oz.

A rare moment was when Lea paid tribute to her mom, Ligaya Salonga, in the moving version of Bette Midler’s Wind Beneath My Wings, as photos of Lea’s family were flashed on the digital screen.

Jett Pangan, a singer who “sings in the key of stratosphere,” as Lea introduced him, did a medley of Billy Joel hits — River of Dreams, Movin’ Out, The Longest Time and Uptown Girl. He later shared the stage with Lea in Move On from yet another Stephen Sondheim musical, Sunday in the Park With George.

The concert covered musicals that were perhaps familiar with the audience, but obviously, Lea opted for less popular and not-often-heard tunes to fill up her repertoire. For instance, she sang With One Look, Norma Desmond’s solo in Sunset Boulevard, instead of the more familiar As If We Never Said Goodbye. Then, too, she rendered Empty Chairs at Empty Tables, Marius’ dilemma in Les Miserables, instead of On My Own or I Dreamed a Dream.

One new piece was You Will Be Found from Dear Evan Hansen, that opened in Broadway only last December. Then, Lea proudly talked about Rachelle Ann Go, who will soon play the female lead, Eliza, in West End’s Hamilton, by Lin-Manuel Miranda. “Every generation has its musical and for this one, it’s Hamilton,” said Lea, who went on to sing Burn.

Tagalog ditties also made it to Lea’s repertoire, like the hauntingly sentimental Magbalik Ka Na Mahal from Ryan Cayabyab’s Rama Hari and even the pop rock anthems in Rak of Aegis — Luha, Sinta, Basang-Basa sa Ulan, Halik.

We later learned they had to pull out one song from the line-up — Still Hurting, the heart-wrenching opener from The Last Five Years — maybe to shorten the repertoire a bit. Minsan Minahal ay Ako, the tearful ballad in Ryan’s Katy, was also not included, although it was in the original line-up. Noticeably, a Miss Saigon song became expendable, too.

The powerful encores came — Whitney Houston’s I Wanna Dance With Somebody from The Bodyguard and lastly, (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman from Beautiful, which bookended her repertoire.

The concert ran for a good two and a half hours. You think that ended the night? Lea tirelessly agreed to do countless photo-ops onstage after show, but production assistants completely supervised the poses and everything was done in an orderly manner.

Outside the theater, there was a long queue of obviously civilized concert-goers who patiently waited for Lea to sign their really nice souvenir program, even at nearly midnight.