Rachelle Ann Go

Rachelle Ann Villalobos Go-Spies (born August 31, 1986) is a Filipina singer and actress. She began her career by participating in and winning several singing competitions, the first of which was in the long-running Philippine variety show ''Eat Bulaga!'' at age eleven. She rose to fame when she emerged as the Grand Champion of the reality talent search ''Search for a Star'' in 2004. She was previously managed by VIVA Artist Agency and Viva Records. She is currently managed by Cornerstone Talent Management Center.

Go won the Silver Prize award for her song, "From The Start", at the Shanghai Music Festival 2005 and Best Own song, "Isang Lahi", at the Astana International Song Festival 2005 in Astana, Kazakhstan. Since then, she has headlined concerts locally and internationally, recorded seven albums, which became certified gold and double platinum records. Her song "First Burn" together with Lexi Lawson, Arianna Afsar, Julia Harriman and Shoba Narayan debuted and peaked at number 1 in iTunes U.S., making her the first pure Filipino recording artist to reach number 1 in the U.S. music chart. It also charted on Billboard digital songs chart.

Go has also performed in various hit musicals in the Philippines, London's West End and on Broadway. Her debut was in ''The Little Mermaid'', playing the role of Ariel in 2011, for which she won a Best Actress award from Broadway World Philippine Awards; and another in 2013 for ''Tarzan'', playing the role of Jane Porter. Go's theater career continued as she was cast in the 2014 West End revival of the hit musical ''Miss Saigon'', for the role of Gigi Van Tranh. Following this, she was cast in the 30th anniversary staging of ''Les Misérables'' in the role of Fantine. She then made her Broadway debut reprising the role of Gigi in the Broadway revival of Miss Saigon in March 2017. Rachelle Ann Go played the role of Eliza Hamilton in the original West End production of ''Hamilton'' by Lin-Manuel Miranda.

Early life

Rachelle Ann Villalobos Go was born on August 31, 1986. She is the daughter of Oscar and Russel Villalobos-Go. She is the eldest of four children. She studied pre-school to secondary level at La Immaculada Concepcion School in Pasig. She was a choir member of the school as well. She took up the international business and entrepreneurship program at San Beda College in Manila, but due to joining the ''Search for a Star'' talent show on GMA Network, she had to drop out in order to focus more on the latter. In 2008, Go passed the University of the Philippines Open University entrance exam and enrolled.

Career

''Eat Bulaga'': "Birit Baby"

She joined and won several contests. Her television debut on ''Eat Bulaga!'', a hit noontime variety show, happened when she was just eleven. She competed in the show's contest "Birit Baby" where young aspirants belt out vocally challenging songs. She sang Céline Dion's version of "All By Myself". She lost to Loverine Fermino in this competition thus getting the 2nd runner up position.

2003–04: ''Search for a Star'', debut album, Shanghai Music Festival

In 2003, Go auditioned for a talent search on GMA-7, Search for a Star. She passed the auditions and made it as one of the twelve finalists. On March 13, 2004, Go was announced as the grand champion, as she sung her rendition of Mariah Carey's "Through the Rain". After the contest, she transferred to ABS-CBN. Several weeks after winning, she collaborated with Philippine rap group Salbakuta for a cover of the Laura Branigan 1980s hit "Gloria". She then released it as a CD single and it became an instant hit. Go performed the song with the group in the Malacañang Palace, in front of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

In July 2004, Go released her self-titled debut album with the singles "Love of My Life" and a remake of "Don't Cry Out Loud". It also included her own cover version of Selena's "Dreaming of You"., She was then part of the Night Of The Champions U.S. Tour alongside Sarah Geronimo and Erik Santos. She then released a duet with Christian Bautista entitled "You And Me (We Wanted It All)". She was also under the management of VIVA Entertainment Group and was part of ABS-CBN, 'The Kapamilya Network'. She was involved in variety shows such as ASAP and ASAP Fanatic when she became part of Star Magic.

During November 2004, Go represented the Philippines in Shanghai Music Festival's Asia New Singer Competition where she placed as the silver-medalist for her rendition of a Vehnee Saturno-penned song, "From the Start", which won Best Song. This was followed by more success in the 2004 Astana Song Festival where she won a silver award and for the Best Own Country Song for her version of the song, "Isang Lahi."

2005–07: Various projects

In November 2005, Go released her second album, ''I Care''. At the same time, she co-hosted the second season of the reality show ''Search for the Star in a Million''. The album reached Gold status selling 15,000 copies nationwide. The theme song included in the official soundtrack, "Perhaps Love" (Hangul: 사랑인가요, originally sung by J and Howl), was also translated into Tagalog as "Pag-ibig Nga Kaya" and performed by Christian Bautista and Rachelle Ann Go with permission from MBC. The show's finale was aired on April 10, 2007, with ABS-CBN airing the Princess Hours: The Royal Special for two days, April 11 and 12, with both Bautista and Go as hosts.

Early 2007, she released her third album entitled ''Obsession''. Two singles were released: "Don' Say Goodbye" and "Alam ng Ating mga Puso". Also during this year, she and Christian Bautista, performed at the Aliw Theater for their You and Me Valentine Concert which was produced by ASAP Live!. They also had a world tour with the same title.

2008–09: ''Rachelle Ann ROCKS Live!'' and ''Falling in Love''

In April 2008, she released her fourth album under VIVA Records (also her first live album) entitled ''Rachelle Ann ROCKS Live!''. The album reached Gold status after seven months. Her carrier single, Honestly, became an instant hit and she won the 3rd IFM Award for the Song of the Year and Favorite Female Performer.

In January 2009, she released her fifth album entitled ''Falling In Love'' under VIVA Records. It was awarded the Gold Certification by VIVA Music and PARI for outstanding sales of more than 15,000 units. Go also held a concert entitled "Rachelle Ann Go Falling In Love" at the Music Museum. Among some of the guests were Martin Nievera, Gary and Gab Valenciano, Ogie Alcasid, Richard Poon and Co-Champion, Christian Bautista.

2010–11: Transfer to GMA Network, ''Unbreakable'', ''The Little Mermaid''

On April 7, 2010, Go and her manager, Veronique del Rosario-Corpus of Viva Artist Agency, signed an exclusive contract at the GMA Network Center. Rachelle's first project with the Kapuso network was the Sunday musical-variety show '' Party Pilipinas'', where she joined fellow Viva artist Mark Bautista.

For the second half of 2011, Go released her sixth album entitled ''Unbreakable'', with "Masasabi Mo Ba" as the first single and her own composition, "Whispered Fear" as her second single. She also appeared in the GMA 7 drama series ''Nita Negrita'', as Amanda. She was also a mentor in '' Protégé: The Battle for the Big Break'', a reality-based singing talent show. Go made her debut in musical theatre that year as Ariel in ''The Little Mermaid'', for which she won a Best Actress award from Broadway World Philippine Awards.

2012–2013: RAG: Rise Against Gravity concert, ''Miss Saigon'' audition, ''Tarzan'' musical

In 2012, Go produced a solo concert "RAG Rise Against Gravity" with special guests Regine Velasquez-Alcasid, Sarah Geronimo and Christian Bautista. It was held at the Music Museum. She also began auditioning for a role in the then-upcoming London West End revival of ''Miss Saigon''. She took the role Lara in the musical drama series Biritera of GMA 7.

In 2013, Go played Jane Porter in the ''Tarzan'' musical, which ran from June 14 until July 7 at Meralco Theater, Pasig. She also portrayed the role of Libulan (Diwata ng Buwan) in Indio. In June of that year, Go joined the cast of SAS (Sunday All Stars), the revamped Sunday musical variety show of GMA Network.

On August 24, 2013, Go joined the Eat Bulaga!'s ''Hakot Pa More'' segment together with John Vic De Guzman during the failure lucky hakot contestant which was suffer by a Mental Disorder.

2014: ''Miss Saigon'', ''Miss Rachelle: The Send Off Concert'', ''Les Miserables'', international breakthrough

Go was selected for a major role in the 2014 West End revival of ''Miss Saigon''. She played the role of the disillusioned Gigi Van Tranh at the Prince Edward Theatre in London. Go sang one of the show's most notable songs, "The Movie In My Mind". Before flying off to London to play the role of Gigi in the restaging of the hit musical ''"Miss Saigon"'', Go held a two and a half-hour send off concert entitled ''Miss Rachelle: The Send Off Concert'' with special guests Erik Santos, Christian Bautista, Mark Bautista, Sheryn Regis, ''Jimmy Marquez'' and Regine Velasquez-Alcasid. The concert also commemorated Go's 10th anniversary in the entertainment industry.

Go met the Oscar winning actor, Eddie Redmayne who visited Miss Saigon during the sitzprobe. Redmayne also watched the show with other stars like Samantha Barks, Elaine Paige and Gillian Lynne.

Go guested on UK-based television and radio presenter and actress Gaby Roslin's radio show on BBC
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