"Anak" (Filipino for child or more gender specific my son or my daughter) is a Tagalog song written and performed by Filipinofolk-singer Freddie Aguilar. It made the finals for the inaugural 1978 Metropop Song Festival held in Manila. It became an international hit, and was translated into 51 languages.[2] The lyrics speak of Filipino family values.[3] The current copyright owner of the song is Star Music, a recording company owned and operated by the Philippinemedia conglomerateABS-CBN Corporation.[4] It was produced by Celso Llarina of VST & Co, with an arrangement by D'Amarillo (Doming Amarillo). Tito Sotto was the executive producer for this song as well as its album of the same name.[5] It is the best-selling single by a Filipino artist of all time, with over 33 million copies sold worldwide.[6][7][8][9]
Inspiration and composition
Freddie Aguilar left home at the age of 18 without graduating from school. His father, who had wanted him to be a lawyer, was disappointed. Freddie traveled to faraway places carrying with him only his guitar. With no one to guide and discipline him, he got into gambling. Realizing and regretting his mistakes five years later, Freddie composed "Anak", a song of remorse and apology to his parents. He went back home and asked for forgiveness from his parents, who welcomed him with open arms. After his father read the lyrics of "Anak", the two became closer. The homecoming proved timely as his father died not long after.[2] According to Felipe de Leon, Jr., an authority on Philippine music, the song was composed in a Western style but has aspects of pasyon, a form that many Filipinos can identify with.[3]
Impact
"Anak" became a finalist in the first MetroPop Song Festival. It went on to become very popular in the Philippines and eventually abroad. The song generated a hundred cover versions, was released in 56 countries and in 27 different foreign languages, and is claimed to have sold 30 million copies.[10][11][better source needed] This was unlikely, however, and only three songs have been confirmed to have sold at least 30 million copies.
An eponymous film was released in 2000, with a plot inspired by the lyrics of the song.[3]
^Aviado, Pandy (2005). "Isang Balik-tingin sa Pagsasa-Animation ng Tadhana". Huling Ptyk: Da Art of Nonoy Marcelo (in Filipino). The House Printers Corporation. pp. 75–78.
