PAYAPANG DAIGDIG

Lyrics: Brigido Batungbakal and Eduardo de Leon
Music: Felipe Padilla de Leon
Arrangement: Mack Wilberg

The destruction wreaked by World War II was especially devastating in the Philippines’ capital city of Manila. On Christmas night in 1946, just a year after the war’s end, a young Filipino musician named Felipe de Leon climbed on top of some of the highest ruins in the city, and composed a carol of peace, “Payapang Daigdig” (“Peaceful World”) to words by the well-known Filipino journalist, author, and editor Brigido Batungbakal. 

This carol—a beloved tradition in the Philippines—is sometimes regarded as the Filipino equivalent of the Austrian carol “Silent Night,” as both carols refer to the stars as harbingers of peace in the world. The arrangement of “Payapang Daigdig,” which combines the two carols from different centuries and continents, was written by Mack Wilberg especially for Lea Salonga and The Tabernacle Choir.