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0874 Letters of love

One of the 874 letters Alex Palting's grandparents sent back and forth during their courtship between Manila, Phillipines and the U.S. She's created a musical that captures the power of long-distance love. Credit: Alex Palting
One of the 874 letters Alex Palting's grandparents sent back and forth during their courtship between Manila, Phillipines and the U.S. She's created a musical that captures the power of long-distance love. Credit: Alex Palting

Long-distance love can be a challenge. Long-distance love across continents -- well that’s another story. A story told through eight hundred and seventy four letters that singer, composer and writer Alexandra Palting is turning into a musical -- with the apt title: eight hundred seventy four.

It’s the story, the love story, of her Filipino immigrant grandparents. But Palting also found herself in a bi-coastal relationship. She says the letters that offered lessons and comfort for her grandmother decades ago … now did the same for her:

"Long distance taught us to be alone and yet to know that you’re loved. And to be left and know that you are still lovable."

Links: RSVP for 0874, Asian Pasifika Arts Collective, Alexandra Palting

Sheilah Kast is the host of On The Record, Monday-Friday, 9:30-10:00 am.
Melissa Gerr is a Senior Producer for On the Record. She started in public media at Twin Cities Public Television in St. Paul, Minn., where she is from, and then worked as a field producer for Oregon Public Broadcasting in Portland. She made the jump to audio-lover in Baltimore as a digital media editor at Mid-Atlantic Media and Laureate Education, Inc. and as a field producer for "Out of the Blocks." Her beat is typically the off-beat with an emphasis on science, culture and things that make you say, 'Wait, what?'