Francisco “Toti” Fuentes, acclaimed pianist, arranger, conductor and musical director, saw a keyboard he really liked and asked his wife if she could buy it for him. The very next day the keyboard was, quite literally, at his fingertips. Little did he know that several days before, his wife, Joni, had been told by the oncologist that her husband had only six weeks to live.“I played like I never did before,” the musician recalls that day in 2004.
Toti Fuentes—His musical career has been impressive, his music, enduring
“It was a normal hospital visit—or so I thought—except the pain was more intense,” Toti recounts of the fateful hospital visit. “After a five-day confinement, my doctor decided to discharge me while waiting for the laboratory test results. I didn’t realize that while waiting for those results, time was ticking, that I was sent home to spend my last days with Joni and my sons Damien and Xavier.”
But six weeks turned into a few months—and more. Later, he learned of an experimental treatment program being tested by the Novartis Pharmaceutical Company in a hospital in Chicago and Toti thought, “Why not volunteer? I have nothing to lose.” The treatment worked and today, barring any complications, he should be on his way to remission.
A lot of things have happened since that fateful day when he decided to conquer cancer, but it was the acute awareness that he could choose not to succumb to the rare stomach cancer that defined the kind of life he would lead from then on. “I started to enjoy life every minute of the day. Every time I wake up in the morning, I thank God for giving me another day…”
Among the many blessings he invariably thanks heaven for is his wife. “Honestly, I wouldn’t know what to do without Joni,” Toti admits. “She knows about my illness more than I do. She knows what medication I should be taking and at which times of the day. And she has always been there for me.” His wife’s determination to help him has given the musician an even greater resolve to come to terms with his condition and to take the fight to his enemy—no matter what it takes.
“I can’t imagine how painful it must have been for her to hear the news that I only had a few weeks left,” Toti says, “and she had to keep that to herself because she knew it would be best not to tell me. She was right, of course…and for that I will always be truly grateful.”
Musicman on a mission
The very day he decided to fight cancer, he also felt compelled to perform again not just because—as he unabashedly confesses—music is his cure, but because he knew he could help people in need through his music. In 2005 he also collaborated with his long-time friend and colleague, Rico J. Puno, to bring together an all-star cast of artists, singers, and theater actors (including Jacqui Magno, Jenine Desiderio, Ivy Violan, Richard Merk, Bodgie Pascua, Jackielou Blanco, Miguel Castro, Roanne Mallari, and Tirso Cruz III) to record a special Christmas album. Last year, he recorded Montet & Friends, an album featuring internationally acclaimed tenor Ramon “Montet” Acoymo. Proceeds from the sale of both albums were donated to indigent children with cancer.
Together with his manager, Bibsy Carballo, Toti plans to record more CDs to raise funds for cancer-awareness campaigns.
The indefatigable performer has also participated in a Walk for Cancer Awareness, and has given an inspirational talk to some 400 cancer survivors at the Cancer Fair organized by the Philippine Society of Oncologists. “I really want to encourage those who are now fighting cancer not to give up,” he says.
Toti, certainly, has no reason to give up—especially his social work. He partnered with Gawad Kalinga in a summer concert three years ago to raise money for building homes for the poor. The day of the concert, the musician also dedicated a 7.77-mile walk in support of GK777, the NGO’s pledge to build 700,000 homes in 7,000 communities in seven years. He considers himself fortunate to be able to help those who have less. “As far as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to do something for the poor,” he declares. “I am blessed to have sound financial resources for myself and for my family, but some of our kababayan literally do not have anything.”
Coming from a family of eight brothers and sisters, sharing comes naturally to Toti. And since he knows he has the capacity to get other people to help him help others, he doesn’t have qualms “using” his music to do just that.
He dreams of one day putting up an extension of the World of Hope Foundation, a US-based organization Toti and former schoolmate Fr. Michael Semana put up 18 years ago—what he’d like to call Xara Mission Center (in honor of his daughter who has passed away in 2004) that would provide housing and medical assistance to the very poor. “This will be a multipurpose center somewhere in Quezon City—medical clinic, feeding center, day-care center,” Toti muses, already imagining the number of persons who will benefit from the project. “I can’t do this all by myself,” he acknowledges. “So I hope to get as many people as possible to be involved.”
A life shaped by music
To say Toti Fuentes’s 30-year (and counting) musical career is impressive would be an understatement. He has performed with big names in the Philippine music scene as well as with the likes of Sergio Mendes, Andy Williams, Anita Baker, The Lettermen, Aretha Franklin, Jeffrey Osborne, Brazil 88, Natalie Cole, Tony Orlando, and Mariah Carey. He has also conducted the North Dakota Symphony Orchestra and the Louisville Pops Symphony Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra on two separate benefit shows.
He finds it hard to believe how much he has achieved as a musician. “Who would have thought I would one day share the stage with Sergio Mendes?” he asks. “My heart always longs for Brazilian music, and my ‘obsession’ with Sergio Mendes is a case in point.” He had dreamt of performing with the legendary musician since he was a young man. The dream came true in 1988.
Years of honing his skills and refining his musicality (under prominent pianists Sammy Casino and Mary Lee Willikom as a young prodigy, and later on under Professor Bernardino Custodio at the University of Santo Tomas Conservatory of Music) have allowed him to touch the lives of many. “I’ve always wanted to be asked why I was so ambitious with my music,” Toti discloses. Unfortunately, no one has ever thrown him that question. But he poses it now to himself and gives an answer that lets people in not just on the kind of musician he is but also on the kind of person he has chosen to be. “I believe dreams have no borders. The only limit is that which a person himself creates.”
Beyond the big C
In retrospect, the talented performer could have chosen to question why he, who leads a “clean life,” neither smoking nor drinking (and, believe it or not, no nights out either—except when he’s performing), got the big C. But he opted to go past that and instead focused on getting well, even finding the sense of humor to “blame” his only “vice” for getting the gastrointestinal tumor. “My only weakness is I eat everything, anywhere and anytime,” he laughs. “I used to weigh 250 pounds; so I think somewhere along the way I got my illness.”
Now just over half his precancer-days size, Toti looks surprisingly strong—perhaps finding strength in the new meaning he has found in life, nourished by a spirituality rooted in the piety his parents brought him up on way back in Cagayan de Oro, and which was further developed in his school days at the Xavier University. “Faith in God, in music, and in my family has kept me going,” he reveals, “because He is the only one who can help us in our desperate moments.”
Though he maintains his habits of “clean-living” to keep infections at bay, he fesses up that he actually hasn’t changed anything in his lifestyle since his diagnosis. However, he has become a lot more conscientious about his food intake, and has diligently kept to his no-nights-out life, getting enough rest and taking it easy even as he works hard in preparation for each gig. He does consult with his doctors regularly, following the regimen laid out in the experimental treatment he’s undergoing. He remembers doubting the wisdom of “enrolling” in the program. “Minsan hirap akong huminga…Tinanggal ko ‘yung oxygen mask at sinabi ko sa wife ko, ‘Please find gigs for me because I’d rather die performing than having an oxygen mask over my face.’” But that was only momentary. Now that he gets to have as many gigs as his schedule allows, it has been a lot easier for him. Performing has been good therapy.
“What would you have done differently had you known you only had six weeks more to live?” Toti is asked. “I would do the same thing I did—buy a keyboard. And stretch my life longer.” 