Sometimes music is the only medicine the heart and soul need.🌹♠️🖤

MYMP (short for Make Your Momma Proud) is out to touch your hearts again with their brand of musicality and performance. 

Jacques "Chin" Alcantara, former Claretian, founded the band back in late 1996. It was Chin's elder brother, Julius, who gave the band its name --- a tribute to their departed mother. Chin's mother, Dr. Stella Lopez-Alcantara (a cardiologist), had died of complications from breast cancer when he was 17.

Back when it was originally formed, Make Your Momma Proud was a four-man rock band, whose arsenal included Jimi Hendrix, The Doors and, as Alcantara adds, a little Mr. Big. He was still a student at Miriam College then, taking up Communication Arts, major in Advertising. “My mom played the piano but she didn’t get to see me play professionally—she did get to see me start out,” Alcantara said. In the year after his mother died, Alcantara took up the guitar and, in his words, “really got obsessed with it and that’s when I knew what I wanted to be, a musician.” Alcantara was enjoined by his father (an investment and a private development banker) to attend classical guitar tutoring, but stopped after a month. Alcantara taught himself how to play.

The peak of MYMP's amateur days was when it won the 1996 national championship of the San Miguel Beer Battle of (rock) Bands. Before that, the group had won the NCR championship, best vocalist and best lead-guitarist awards.

As a college band, MYMP appeared in college fairs and shows, but as they became more earnest in their intent to pursue music as a career, they encountered difficulty in lining up gigs due to their "disciplined rock" repertoire. MYMP added a keyboardist and began working on a more pop sound, completing the transformation with the addition of a female vocalist in 2000, Marifil Niña Girado, known then as the R&B singer [and later as Nina--the Soul Siren}] after leaving the band to go solo. MYMP then industriously performed in bars, clubs and shows for years, building an identity.

In 2001, Alcantara handed an audition for a new female lead, and the group found Julie Iris "Juris" Fernandez. Originally from Davao, Fernandez explains she didn’t grow up exposed to music on a regular basis. Like Alcantara, Fernandez did not study music formally for long, eschewing the training to learn on her own. After graduating from Miriam, Fernandez was studying at the Ateneo, working towards completing her pre-med requirements when she decided that, like Alcantara, she wanted to immerse herself in music. After singing with Jimmy Bondoc, she fatefully auditioned for MYMP.

In the last quarter of 2018, MYMP management held a grand audition for a new female vocalist. And after almost a year, with numerous applicants, and a number of potentials, they chose Carmella Ravanilla from Taytay Rizal. Carmella, also a Miriam graduate, is a former contender in a popular reality singing contest, bested 10 other hopefuls for the coveted lead vocalist spot. 2018 also marked the year when MYMP returned to its original label, Ivory Music. And they released a new original song single "WISHES AND DREAMS" after almost 6 years. The band is under the management of Maria Teresa Alcantara.

For bookings/inquiries contact Tere Tinio - +639171051115

jbeatricepsl is following