In the Valhalla of his mind, my friend was convinced that there was basis for Hitler to believe in the supremacy of the Aryan race. “Just listen to the music of the German composers,” he said. “Beethoven. Bach. And, on top of my list, Wagner.”

He argued, “What other race could produce that kind of music?”

I remembered his fond theory when I attended an all-Wagner program of the University of Santo Tomas Symphony Orchestra at CCP last week. It was a huge event – a full orchestra, chorus of 200-plus voices, the conductor, Hermie Ranera, in tails, and every seat in the house taken.

A closer look showed that every male member of the orchestra was likewise in tails, just as all the girls were uniformly in sleeveless, black long gowns (with earrings to match). Inside the main theater, streamers in red were everywhere draping the upper and lower boxes, announcing the three K’s of CCP: Kabutihan. Katotohanan. Kagandahan. (The good, the true and the beautiful.)

The banners were so many and so red that for a while I thought a revolution, at least a coup, was in the offing.

A revolutionary feeling, at least. The swelling, soaring music of Richard Wagner, the kind that attaches wings to feet of clay and lifts an unextraordinary body to dizzying heights where only warrior archangels and princely seraphim fly. Performed by disciplined students and their determined faculty, the Wagnerian epics contributed to an impressive night, a Tannhauser night, plus Lohengrin, The Flying Dutchman, but no Tristan and Isolde. Still, it was music to shake the soul, awaken every pore, pour new emotions into every sack of flesh and blood held together by skin.

Though the repertoire provided but a glimpse of the “dramatic spectacle” that the composer envisioned for his works, it will be a tough act to follow in 2011, when UST is expected to celebrate its 400th with drama and spectacle.

Nearly at the end of 2009, Father Rector Rolando de la Rosa, O.P. does not even want to think of designating a probable successor to the dean of the conservatory, Dr. Raul Sunico, who must now share his time between UST and CCP, which he heads as acting president and artistic director.