Joey Ayala

Who is Joey Ayala?

Joey Ayala is a Filipino singer, songwriter and former chairman of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts. He is well known for his style of music that combines the sounds of Filipino ethnic instruments with modern pop music. His public music life started when he released an album recorded in a makeshift-studio in 1982 in Davao City. To date, he has released fourteen albums.

Some of the Filipino ethnic instruments Ayala is known to use include the two-stringed Hegalong of the T'Boli people of Mindanao, the Kubing, the bamboo jaw harp found in various forms throughout the Philippines, and the 8-piece gong set, Kulintang, the melodical gong-rack of the indigenous peoples of the southern part of the country. He also uses modern instruments in his music, such as the electric guitar, bass guitar, synthesizer/sequencer and drums.

The name of his band "Bagong Lumad" literally means "New Native" - a name and philosophy that has been carried over into Bagong Lumad Artists Foundation, Inc., now a UNDP Responsible Party working on SiningBayan capacity-building projects with the Civil Service Commission, the Department of Education, and other GOs and NGOs in the Philippines.