PALAU No. 4 chess player Roberto Hernandez is about to start writing a book entitled "CHESS AND MUSIC: PERFECT COMBINATION."
It will feature his music and chess exploits since early 1970's to present.
The proposed cover of the book will feature two world rated chess players (probably Hilton Bennett of New Zealand and Gary Bekker of Australia) playing, with the background of Palau Royal Resort beach and hotel.
Also in the background cover will be the Yamaha Portable Grand keyboard (DGX-220) that Hernandez is using as musician at Breeze Bar of PRR.
Among the countries where Hernandez played music are Japan (April 04, 1982-September 28, 1982), Bahrain (January 1987-April 1989) and Palau (Feb. 04, 1982 - Present).
Although he didn't have much chess activities in Bahrain, he made an effort to look for the office of Bahrain Chess Federation, which is now one of the much improved chess federation and regularly send players to almost every Chess Olympiads, Zonal and local invitational.
Chess activities were also limited in his short stay in Japan where he played keyboard with the band called "First Quarter", a 5-person group of a drummer (Toto), a bass guitarist (Matt), a lead guitarist (Frankie Ganalon), a lady singer (Jane Ramas) and pianist/keyboard (Roberto Hernandez).
Chess and music activities in the Philippines were more active with Hernandez learning guitar first, them marimba, bamboo flute and later drums and bass guitar.
A 7-year-old boy taught him how to play chess in the early 1970's and became inspired by Grandmaster Eugene Torre's success in becoming Asia's first Grandmaster.
He played one friendly game with him at Alemar's Bookstore in Makati, while Torre is promoting his book "Beyond the 13th Move".
They both participated in the 1990 Philippines National Chess Championship where the top 6 finishers will represent Philippines in the biannual World Chess Olympiad.
Torre was the top seed and finished 2nd to GM Rogelio 'Joey' Antonio, Jr. while Hernandez was seeded 218 out of 240 players.
Only players with 1800 rating and above were accepted in that tourney.
Chess in Palau have started in June 09, 2002 and since then 3 tournaments every year were held with undetermined number of blitz chess held mostly after the completion of regular games.
Most of Hernandez' chess experience in Palau will become one of the promotional appeal of the book that will feature the beauty of Palau as a place to visit or stay.
Mr. Jan Berglund, Palau official representative to FIDE (World Chess Federation) will be asked to publish and edit the book as he had published and edited more than 25 books already.
Source: Chessmate by Roberto Hernandez
Tia Belau Newspaper
Pages 13 & 15
Volume 18
Issue 05
January 26-February 01, 2009
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