Traditional Referentiality in Felix Khensay's Literary Contribution

Abstract

This paper borrows the concept of traditional referentiality from Oral Traditional Theory and applies it to interpret the songs of Felix Khensayof Bontoc, Mountain Province, Philippines adapted by contemporary pop music enthusiasts as performed by a Bontok band called the Petune and other national choral groups with special kind of improvisation and fusion. It also informs briefly who Felix Khensay as a distinctive Bontokcomposer, his songs written in a Bontok language, his melodic and poetic styles, and patterns, and also the evocative application of his songs that became referentially meaningful in the memories of the Bontok community. The paper then installs traditional referentiality(TR) as a concept framed from the lens of Oral Tradition Theory and anchored on Michael Drout’s Meme Based Approach and applies it to the common songs produced by the Petune band and also as a winning piece of a national choral competition in the Philippines. It also explains and illuminates the operations of anaphoric repetition and pattern-recognition on the musical texts of Khensay’s selected two songs. Through textual analysis, this paper contributes making an initial assessment of Khensay’s songs’ functions viewed as cultural universals in the traditional referents that are significant to the Bontok community.