About me and this site
Just a Filipino percussionists with a background in Classical music sharing my personal experiences and journey with Kulintang.
With the permission to share, of course.
Who am I?
My name is Kevin Calamayan, a musician raised in Hawai'i, heavily shaped by Western classical traditions. Music has been my way of exploring the world, while expressing myself and connecting with others, whether through ensembles, teaching, or personal study. My journey with music has been constantly guided by curiosity, discipline, and the joy of making music, especially with other people.
At the same time, I’ve always been conscious of the parts of my identity I didn’t fully understand. Growing up as a Filipino American, I was surrounded by a culture that felt both very familiar yet very distant. Stories of heritage and culture existed that I could hear about, but never fully grasp. Music has become one of the few ways I feel I can step closer to that culture, and Kulintang, in particular, has offered a pathway to understanding both my roots and my own place within them.
What is this site?
This site exists for a few reasons.
Over the years, I’ve met countless people who are curious about Kulintang. Many of them had never heard of it until someone introduced it to them, which was also the case for me. When I started learning, I realized how hard it can be to find beginner-friendly information. Nothing replaces learning directly from those who carry the tradition, and there will never be a substitute for that. However, I wanted to create a small starting point for anyone who wants to understand what they are looking at before choosing whether or not to dive deeper into the tradition.
This space is also something personal for me. I wanted a place to keep track of the pieces I’m learning and the cultural context that comes with them. The repertoire is quite vast. Balancing my classical percussion background with learning Kulintang can become overwhelming. Having this public record helps me hold onto what I’ve learned, and if it happens to help someone else who is starting out, that’s even better.
More than anything, this site reflects where I am in my own learning. My understanding is shaped by growing up in Hawai'i and by my background in Western music, so I’m not speaking for the whole tradition. I’m simply sharing what I know so far. My hope is to make Kulintang feel a little more approachable, while still pointing people toward culture bearers and communities who carry this music every day.
This site was created as the capstone requirement for my undergraduate degree program and was supervised by ethnomusicologist Dr. Ricardo D. Trimillos.
What's my musical background?
I really didn’t start out loving music. In elementary school, we had classes on 'ukulele and recorder, and I went through them without feeling much of anything, simply going through the motions. I only joined band in middle school because my parents signed my name on the registration. Somewhere along the way, though, music found its place in my life. By high school, I was fully committed. I was studying percussion seriously and taking private lessons to better myself. In college, I continued this journey by majoring in music and taking every chance I could to join ensembles. Any reason to play music, I took. What began as something I pushed away so heavily slowly became something I can’t imagine my life without.
I discovered Kulintang in Spring 2024, when my teacher, Ronald Querian, was convinced by a close friend of mine to reopen a class at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa. At first, I remained in the class out of curiosity. In fact, the reason I joined in the first place was simply because the same friend who invited our teacher was also the one who took my computer and signed me up. And because I’m Filipino, and the class was titled, “Philippine Ensemble,” it felt like something I should experience regardless. It soon became something deeper. The journey began with curiosity toward a tradition that was new to me, and I tried to learn as much as I could during that first semester. Things shifted a few semesters later when I learned that I have a relative in the Philippines who plays Kulintang. Even though I don’t have a stable way to reach her, the tradition itself became a bridge back to my family. Learning this music has become both a personal search and a cultural connection, and I am still moving through the early stages of understanding the repertoire and the world that surrounds it.
An attempt in finding my place in Filipino Culture
Growing up, my connection to Filipino culture has always felt very “half-formed.” My grandparents on both sides speak multiple Filipino languages, and whenever my relatives gathered, conversations would move effortlessly between them, sometimes even mid-sentence. It was normal for them, but to me it always sounded like a world I wasn’t fully part of, or one that felt too difficult to enter. My parents only spoke English, though I know they understand a few phrases from certain languages. English is the language I primarily grew up with. I listened to the sounds of Ilocano, Visayan, and other languages around me, but I never had the fluency to join in.
I always wanted to bridge that gap, not just through language, but through culture as well. Even now, I can hold everyday conversations in a couple of Filipino languages, but my abilities still don’t compare to the range and ease my family has. That distance, of being surrounded by a culture I belonged to but didn’t feel fully rooted in, has strongly shaped how I see myself.
Kulintang became part of the way I’m trying to reconnect. It isn’t just an art form I’m learning, but also a space where I feel I can contribute, listen, understand, and finally step into a cultural lineage I’ve been searching for. This site is one small extension of that effort, a place where I can explore my identity, honor where I come from, and continue figuring out my place within the vastness of Filipino culture.
Sometimes I catch myself asking what I’m supposed to do with the Kulintang knowledge I’m gaining. Does learning the music, even without full fluency in the languages, make me more or less Filipino? As a Filipino American caught between two worlds, I genuinely wonder if I am too American, or not Filipino enough. Growing up in Hawai'i, surrounded by family who effortlessly switch between dialects while I primarily spoke English, I have always felt a certain distance from the culture I belong to by ancestry. Can culture be reclaimed through music, or does it require something deeper, like language, memory, or lived experience? And where do people like me, living between Filipino and American spaces, fit within a tradition that has existed far longer than we have?
These questions don’t have easy answers, but they are what drive me to keep learning, playing, and documenting my journey. Kulintang has become a way to explore my heritage, bridge the gaps I’ve felt, and try to understand my place in a culture that feels both familiar and just out of reach.
Final thoughts
Learning Kulintang is still full of surprises for me. Some days it feels like solving a puzzle, other days like having a conversation with the past. I make mistakes, laugh at them, and keep going, because every step brings me closer to understanding the tradition, as well as the culture behind it.
If you’re curious, inspired, or just want to say hello, feel free to reach out. I’d love to connect and exchange ideas with anyone interested in Kulintang, Filipino culture, or music in general. Just remember that my answers, my thoughts, my understandings, and especially my mistakes are my own.