Few ladies on the local band scene can lay claim to legitimate star tag with real hits to mention and a voice distinctive as a songbird “in a tree by the brook.”
Acel, who rose to fame carrying her maiden surname Bisa, belongs to that elite circle. She fronted for Moonstar88 for just a quarter of the band’s two-decade existence. Yet, being the master recording voice behind big hits like “Torete” and “Sulat,” OPM fans generally consider her stint in the group as having cemented her legacy.
The timing of Moonstar88’s emergence on the music scene couldn’t be more perfect. She was on board in the period between the limelight exit of alternative rock acts and the entry of a new wave of local bands sometime in the mid-2000s. At a time the acoustic scene was lording it, Acel and her gang showed it’s still okay to be plugged in.
The drawback of such success meant she would have a difficult time duplicating it as solo even if she has continued to churn out good performances even after she left Moonstar88 in 2004, or the same year she got married to her friend Danny van Ommen.
In fact early this year she was already thinking of “quitting entirely.”
But fate intervened and she got a turnaround call from Star Music’s Jonathan Manalo who expressed interest in songs she passed at Himig Handog songwriting competition.
“Acel, during the blind screening, when we heard your song, I just knew it was you,” Manalo told her.
It was revealed she made it to the Top 20 but missed the final cut. Instead, she found herself signing a recording contract with Star’s sub-label DNA Music. She was quickly asked to record her take of Rico Blanco’s “Your Universe,” which became the theme song of the movie Between Maybes starring the controversial Gerald Anderson and Julia Barretto.
Acel certainly caught a bus worth waiting for.
She also recorded and released the original “Pitik Bulag,” arranged and produced by Jack Rufo. The title pertains to a Filipino traditional game wherein one player closes his eyes and must correctly guess the number of fingers the other player flashes once the hand is flicked.
Acel related, “A relationship is not a game that someone should win. We must try to choose to be kind with the words we say and things we do when we find ourselves in a disagreement.”
In a special gig last July 18, she, with friends and fans, celebrated the release of the song and its music video featuring young, real-life couple Kat and Bryan with senior versions of themselves portrayed by her parents Simplicio and Paulina Bisa—both established literature professors and novelists who have been devoted to each other for well over 50 years.
Looks like the moon and stars, probably 88 of them, have aligned for Acel this year. Her future looks brighter than ever.