Las Piñas Boys Choir

The Las Piñas Boys Choir, of Las Piñas City, Philippines, is a boys choir made up of scholarship students at the St. Joseph's Academy, and performs regularly in the annual International Bamboo Organ Festival and at the Parish of St. Joseph.

The choir was founded by a Belgian and missionary, the Reverend Father Leo Renier, CICM, who was assistant parish priest of St. Joseph's Parish and who believed that the parish's Bamboo Organ could achieve its full glory if there was a good choir to accompany it. Therefore, in September, 1969, three months after his arrival in the Parish, Fr. Leo began recruiting young boys between 8 and 12 years from the parochial as well as public schools in Las Piñas.

During the first years, rehearsals were held on the ground-floor of the parish rectory, with a small harmonium as accompaniment. Occasionally, an Orff-instrumentarium was used as well. In 1972, the choir participated in the First National Children’s Choir Competition placed third.

This quest for excellence also demanded a full-time conductor. In April 1973, Engracio Tempongko was hired to train and conduct the choir. He had been formerly training the Manila Cathedral Boys’ Choir under Fr. John Vande Steen, and the Santo Domingo Boys’ Choir. The name “Himig Kawayan” was dropped. The newly adopted name simply referred to the location, and the official name was born: the “Las Piñas Boys Choir”

The choir also now acquired an official “choir-room” on the ground-floor of the old building which was replaced later by the 5-storey building. The location was the site of the present stage in the auditorium..

When the choir participated in the 3rd National Competition of Children’s Choirs on November 23, it captured the First Prize. The LPBC had its first performance outside Manila two weeks later, in Baguio, on December 6. Numerous appearances and command performances in Malacañang and the Cultural Center of the Philippines followed.

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