Grace Labaguis

Synergy Production and Marketing Inc., founded by husband and wife team Ronald and Grace Labaguis, to promote emerging Filipino-American artists and performers in the East Coast, successfully wrapped up its maiden project, a concert billed as 'An Evening of Original Philippine Music with Cecile Azarcon and Sounds of Manila,' featuring musical direction by Lorrie Ilustre, held Sunday, April 27, at Symphony Space on 95th Street and Broadway.

While the Filipino food pancit, lumpia, and balut are slowly breaking into mainstream America, Original Philippine Music (OPM) should not be too far behind—food and music go well together anyway, which has inspired Synergy Productions and Marketing Inc. to stage the concert “An Evening of Original Philippine Music with Cecile Azarcon and Sounds of Manila” at Peter Norton Symphony Space (2537 Broadway and 95th Street) on Sunday, April 27, at 7 p.m.

On his way out of the Amazura Concert Hall in Jamaica, Queens, where the cast of GMA Pinoy TV's hit TV series 'My Husband's Lover' had a well-attended thanksgiving concert for fans, model-singer turned actor Tom Rodriguez had a quick interview with BroadwayWorld.com, whose readers from the Philippines have earlier nominated him for Best Actor (Musical) and Best Crossover Artist (Mainstream to Theater) at the 2013 BroadwayWorld Awards-Philippines.

Heroism and excellence in the nursing profession won the predominantly Filipino American audience that gave a well-deserved standing ovation to NYU Langone nurse Menchu De Luna Sanchez--superstorm Sandy's hero nurse--when she personally received her The Oustanding Filipino Americans in New York (TOFA-NY) award from Deputy Consul General Zaldy Patron and Southern District of New York Judge Lorna Schofield at the Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall Saturday night.

Philippine Consul General to New York Mario L. De Leon, Jr., United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York Honorable Judge Lorna Schofield, and Former Chairman of the Board for the Hollywood Foreign Press Association Ruben Nepales will keynote the third annual The Outstanding Filipino Americans in New York (TOFA-NY) Awards on Saturday night, October 26, at Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall, the official venue of the TOFA-NY Awards ceremonies for the past three years.