This performance autoethnography sought to dwell upon meanings in a musical concert: ?Waray Gad La? featuring well-loved folksongs of Leyte and Samar islands in the Philippines. It expressed my folk sensibility in spite of my experimentations in form mixing various genres that would give rise to hybridization, transformation, self-identity, cycles of emotions, emancipation, and vulnerability as concepts revealed in the autoethnographic analysis. While they embodied cultural representations, this autoethnogrpahy focused mainly on musical aspects of performance foregrounding the themes identified. The purpose of the study was to explore and analyze performances of ?Waray Gad La? from a musical perspective using reflexivity in order to illuminate personal meanings within cultural praxis. Moreover, it was meant to unearth deep layers in interpretation of the featured performances mirrored with cultural resonances crossing over folkloric temperament layered with classical and new age nuances enriching sound poetry that would usher a new sound of age-old musical lore. The study revealed that folksongs are not hackneyed expressions but with creative imagination, they can be re-created sensibly and powerfully. Grounded on the principle of universal musical expression, ?Waray Gad La? epitomized experimentations in music structure unleashing energy in re-designing folksongs as artistic creations imbued with fresh ideas and emotions through meaningful associations as music rhetoric beyond persuasion.

Keywords: folksongs of Leyte and Samar; meanings in music; musical hybridization; performance autoethnography in music