band that played American jazz standards. Then, as a member of the Baguio Arts Guild she fronted a punk-rock group called The Blank that performed American and British underground music. The Blank gained a sizable following in the northern city of Baguio and in the Philippines’ capital, Manila. Almost famous playing for enthusiastic crowds but confused with her musical direction, Grace decided to quit singing. “I realized … that there was a yawning divide between my reality and the mission that one teacher at the Philippine High School for the Arts had stated for me: ‘to search for the Filipino cultural identity,’” she wrote in The Shared Voice. Shortly thereafter, Grace met oral traditional singers in the mountains that connected her home province of Agusan with the provinces of Davao and Bukidnon. She noted in a lecture: “I could not believe my ears when I first heard their voices. I could not locate them in music I was taught in school patterned after colonial models.” At that point, Grace began the process of "finding her voice" that she associated with voice decolonization. In the 1990s, Grace became one of the pillars of what was then called the “Philippine alternative music scene,” a loose movement that was picked up by the major record labels. With the help of her friends Noni Buencamino, Alex Cruz, Boy Yunchengco and Dodong Viray, and in collaboration with Bob Aves, composer, arranger, record producer and musical director, Grace released several multi-awarded and high-profile solo recordings that fused popular and traditional music styles: Tao Music (Record Plant 1992, BMG Pilipinas 1993), Opo (BMG Pilipinas 1995), and Isang Buhay (BMG Pilipinas 1998). When the major record labels withdrew their support for music that did not comply with commercial trends, Grace was expected to shift to a more market driven sound in order to survive the music business. She, however, remained steadfast in her musical vision. Without corporate support, she independently co-produced other award-winning solo albums: Hulagpos: Women’s Music and Poetry (with prominent women poets Marra Pl. Lanot, Elynia Mabanglo, Luisa Igloria, among others, Arugaan ng Kalakasan 1999), Diwa (Tao Music 2008), and Dalit (Tao Music 2009). Grace also went deeper in her study of oral traditional musics, learning the performance of a few traditional chants from elderly singers in different parts of the Philippines. After the name of her daughter, Tao, Grace also co-established the independent record label