Music & Mediations
Ryan Camus graduated from the Ateneo in 2010 with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. He immediately decided to pursue his music career at the Berklee College of Music in the United States. He graduated summa cum laude in 2014 with a Bachelor of Music in Film Scoring, along with a minor in Theory of Jazz and Popular Song. His styles include contemporary jazz, classical, rock, and blues. His notable works include composing and orchestrating for an upcoming video game called, “Soul Saga”. He also worked with other video game developers namely, Zigza Games Inc. Japan, Edible Games Australia, Rendered World Games USA, Quantum Game Studios Belgium, and Zeenoh Games in the Philippines. Aside from video game scoring, he has also scored a feature film called Multiplex in November 2015. In addition to his scores for video games and movies, he also composed pieces for advertisements for Real Escape Games by Stereo Image Inc. Singapore and an online advertisement for Sykes Enterprises in the Philippines.
Listening to his library is a testament to his versatility as a musician. He can write for several different milieu and it would all bring about the beauty of that setting and mood. He also rescores scenes from known movies like The Snowman, Harry Potter, and How to Train a Dragon. Other works of his include the Technical Institute of the Philippines’ Fight Song, We’re on Top of the World and the same school’s hymn, You’ll be in my Heart Forever.
In his own way, Ryan Camus showcases a very Filipino touch with his music. This raises the question: “What really is Philippine music?” This could be answered as follows: Philippine music comes from a Filipino composer willing to take his innate culture and share it with the world, and have the world contribute to it as well. This is perhaps what drives Ryan Camus to continue his career in music. No matter how foreign an influence may be, no matter how foreign a piece might sound, it is made by a person whose culture regards music as innate. It is because of this innate understanding of music, that Ryan Camus continues to inspire several Filipinos to continue writing and sharing music for different purposes.
Philippine music’s strength lies in an acknowledgement of its roots, with a willingness to discover how far these roots can be mixed with other genres. No matter how much foreign influence finds its way into Filipino music, there is an intuitive and innate nature to how music is understood by Filipinos that still maintains a sense of the “Philippines” in its identity. It is in this that Ryan Camus’ strength lies; in his ability to take these foreign influences and maintain an identity that is still distinctly Filipino in its sensibilities and execution.
*This article was originally written on May 9, 2016.
*Edited by Liam Tolentino and Bianca Bautista
*Published by Quino Papa
Sources:
[1] Ryan Camus Official Website: http://www.ryancamus.com/
[2] Ryan Camus Resume: http://static1.squarespace.com/static/535343b9e4b014c44cd630ab/t/558d5ec0e4b033c6e8a4c570/1435328192978/Camus_Ryan_Composer_ONESHEET.pdf