BARMM residents welcome US-trained musicians from autonomous region

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Residents of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao are looking forward to the June 21 piano and violin concert at the University of the Philippines Diliman featuring two members of prominent BARMM families who trained abroad.

The pianist Jenna Datumanong Salliman and the violinist Adrian Nicolas Chio Ong shall together perform in their Espressivo Concert on June 21 at the Kolehiyo ng Arte at Literatura Theater in UP-Diliman, officials of different agencies in BARMM announced on Wednesday morning, June 3.

“We are proud of these two young musicians, both from big families in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao,” Myrah Borja Mangkabung, superintendent of the Basilan Schools Division, told reporters in BARMM on Wednesday.

Jeanne, the mother of the violinist Ong, 26, from the big Chio clan, whose members are residing in Cotabato City, the capital of BARMM, and in Datu Piang town in Maguindanao del Sur, one of the five provinces in the BARMM.

Ong’s father, Allan, and her mother are both dentists, operating a dental clinic in Quezon City.

Annie, the mother of the 26-year-old pianist Salliman, is daugther the late Simeon Ampatuan Datumanong, an ethnic Maguindanaon, who had served as chairman of the defunct Lupong Tagapagpaganap ng Pook 12 in Cotabato City, as in-charge of the Office on Muslim Affairs and, subsequently, as secretary of the Department of Public Works and Highways.

Datumanong was also congressional representative of the still undivided Maguindanao province before he passed away from an illness about two decades ago.

Salliman's father, Hadjiman, who is of Yakan descent, is the incumbent vice governor of Basilan. He was governor of the island province for three consecutive terms prior to his election to his present post during the May 12, 2025 elections.

Traditional Moro datus in Maguindanao del Sur's adjoining Ampatuan and Shariff Aguak towns, related by blood to Salliman, told reporters on Wednesday that they are so proud of her.

“Her being a pianist trained in the United States is a proof that residents of the Bangsamoro region are just as competitive, in music, arts and sciences and in other fields with those in other non-Moro regions in the country,” said Anwar Kuit Emblawa, a ranking staff member of the Office of the Municipal Mayor in Shariff Aguak.

Her relatives in Cotabato City said on Wednesday that the US-trained pianist Salliman was recently admitted to the Chautauqua Piano Institute in New York as a scholar of the National Society of Arts and Letters in the US, a non-stock, non-profit entity supporting potential artists pursuing professional education in music and arts.

Ong, after graduating from the Philippine High School for the Arts in Los Baños, Laguna, studied music and arts at the Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan, where he graduated with honors.

“We are mighty proud of him and Jenna Datumanong Salliman, who are from pioneer clans in what is now the Bangsamoro region,” said Alexander Chio Mabinay, a member of the technical service team in the office in Cotabato City of BARMM parliament member Romeo Kabuntalan Sema, who is also from a noble Moro clan.

Two members of the 80-seat BARMM parliament, Ishak Veloso Mastura and Zulfikar-Ali Sergio Bayam, both Maguindanaon datus, separately said the young musicians Salliman and Ong deserve special honors from the region's lawmaking body, which is based in Cotabato City.