Site content/intellectual property: Copyright © 1999-2011 by Jasmine Orpilla. All rights reserved.  

Offering Vocal Destruction© for Ninja Academy since 1979.  

Ninjamamalickum, a.k.a. Jasmine Orpilla, is a Filipina-American vocal performance artist and composer for experimental musical theatre. Though raised in Saudi Arabia and Japan her musical roots remain in her family’s barrio of Salindeg in Ilocos Sur, Philippines. Her G3-E6 full vocal range spans not only her immersion into various eclectic styles and vocal placements meant for male as well as female voices, but also her respect to the different cultures in which she had immersed herself in order to learn traditional music from Japan, China, Philippines, etc. Strongly marked by her experiences performing for significant world theatre and opera directors Ariane Mnouchkine, Peter Sellars, Akira Matsui (Nogaku, Kita School) and Master Pei Yanling (Peking Opera), she teamed up with both ARTA (Association de Recherche des Traditions de l’Acteur) and Grenoble’s Theatre 145 in France, in order to further her passion for world theatre traditions in performance and their relevant connection to both her heritage and her political beliefs in art for social change… 

-Current Happenings Here- 

…Her resulting multi-disciplinary vocal performance art pieces earned her attention in Parisian and Berlin performance festivals as well as the eventual prize from the Mayor and City of Paris for original electroacoustic composition, (for jazz quintet, voice, Parisian field recordings and set to her translation of Bertolt Brecht’s poetry into French Sign Language; Festival Metiss’Age- l’Amour;,  Les Chantiers de Blaye, Vues d’Ici 2003; Prix Paris Jeunes Talents, 2004). Her various lyrics and vocal arrangements also received national radio play in France and have distribution throughout Europe (SACEM; Radio France; Edel Records, Warner France). Her first recording for the USA was itself an international musical exchange, in vocal improvisation with experimental guitarist Nels Cline… 

…The only Filipina-American performing professionally in the Paris circuit in the late 90′s, Jasmine eventually co-starred on several French national television series and films (TF1 2002-2004), participated in the creation of Théâtre du Soleil’s “le Dernier Caravanserail,” and was featured in numerous Parisian theatre companies in the collaboration of original musical theatre works, featuring her compositions (Les Blancs Manteaux, Les Deschargeurs, Théâtre du Chaudron, Cabaret Sauvage). Ironically, she would perform onstage not only in Ilocano but also in fluent French, and German, Japanese and Cantonese yet never in her native English until her return to the USA in 2006… 

-Current Happenings Here- 

…In California, her work as a performance artist has been featured on KTLA Morning News, on ABS-CBN for The Filipino Channel and selected for art shows and events throughout L.A. (The Hammer Museum, LACE, Skirball Cultural Center, OTIS, Cannibal Art Flower,  Downtown L.A. Artwalk, Chinatown ArtNight, etc).  In an array of vocal identities, she has sung at most commercial and underground L.A. music festivals and venues such as the Knitting Factory, the Crash Mansion, the Steve Allen Theatre, the Echo, Eagle Rock Music Festival, Venice Beach Music Festival, the Upright Citizens Brigade with Matt Walsh and Tim Meadows, to name a few. In 2008, Jasmine completed a performance tour of the United States in a one-woman, eight-multi-ethnic-character show dealing with the controversies of racial diversity in America. In Spring ’09 she was selected to perform in both ArtTalk (Pasadena Playhouse District, Boston Court Theatre, in solo performance) and ArtNight Pasadena ‘09, for which she, together with the multidisciplinary post-prog-punk-bebop band Ninja Academy were awarded a grant to perform from the city’s Arts & Culture Commission and the Division of Cultural Affairs. 2009 also marked the development and performance of Jasmine Orpilla’s latest vocal ’art-as-social-action’ heritage pieces which were curated twice in a row by REDCAT (see below).  Recently, Jasmine has collaborated in the creation and live performance of original sound structures with experimental musicians Steve Roden, Hans Fjellestad and Alan Nakagawa. In June 2010, she was awarded the Durfee ARC grant for her experimental musical theatre work, featured at the Los Angeles Theatre Center, where she is currently Musical Director and performing member of the controversial Vault Ensemble…

 Recent surprises include: TED Conference 2011, curated by Juan Enriquez and Bill Gates; at Machine Project directed by Asher Hartman and at LACE, providing music in the moustache…

WARNING: Slight ‘highbrow’ matter in the above text. Why not get to know a Ninja by simply clicking on stuff in the orange column to the right, starting with ‘All New Live Shows’ ? Please ENJOY!  

*Site content/intellectual property: Copyright © 1999-2011 by Jasmine Orpilla. All rights reserved. 

Ninjamamalickum in “EGGS.” Coming in 2011. Click on “All New Live Shows” for upcoming performances.

For my piece “The Typhoon, the Rope, and the Slippers,” playing at REDCAT in Walt Disney Concert Hall this November, I am collaborating with People’s CORE, 501 (c)(3), KmB Pro-People Youth, and the Alliance for a Just and Lasting Peace in the Philippines (AJLPP) to request your support to aid our sisters and brothers in the Philippines through Sagip-Tulong sa Pilipinas Emergency Relief Fund. Donations, such as those integrated within our performance, are arranged with Ang Kalusugan para sa Pinoy Inc. (AKAP: Embracing with Care), a non-profit organization registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission with 21 health stations in Metro Manila. AKAP is located at 7 Mulawin St., Mapayapa Village III, Capital Hills, Quezon City, tel. (632) 425-2576.  We will be collecting donations throughout the remainder of 2009. 

A very special thanks to The Filipino Channel ABS-CBN  for doing the feature on my performance to help with our awareness efforts! 

…For upcoming performances, click on “All New Live Shows.”   

Thank you! 

The Typhoon, the Rope and the Slippers, copyright © 2008-2010 by Jasmine Orpilla.