Here’s a bit about me.
Grace Oberhofer is a bi-coastal artist who tells stories about women--either real or imagined--who are not perfect, but rather, amazing. A Tacoma, WA native and a Tufts graduate, Grace works as a composer, performer, sound designer, and educator. As a composer, Grace has created multiple music theater works for adult and all-ages audiences. She also works as a sound maker through theatrical sound design, devised sound, and scoring for film and media. A trained vocalist, Grace works as a vocalist for live concerts and film & TV.
Grace’s compositional works include the ICONS/IDOLS choral play series with playwright/lyricist Helen Banner (OPERA America Discovery Grant, New Ohio/IRT Archive Residency), HOT CROSS BUNS with playwright/co-lyricist Julia Izumi (Corkscrew Festival, Seattle Rep), A DOLL’S HOUSE: A NEW OPERA with director/co-writer Allison Benko (The Tank, Central Square, Corkscrew), DEAR RUTH also with Allison Benko (Puffin Foundation), and THE COLOR OF THINGS with book writer/lyricist Lisa Mongillo, among others.
Grace has worked in various capacities at theaters like Playwrights Horizons, Adirondack Theater Festival, Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater, Ars Nova, and HERE. She has performed with theater-makers at spots like Cherry Lane, The Brick, Green Room 42, and 54 Below. Recently, she was seen singing backup on tour with her pals Geese, opening for Jack White. Grace is an alumna of the Broadcast Music, Inc. Musical Theater workshop and the New Dramatists Composer-Librettist Studio.
And a bit more…
As a teaching artist, she worked for several years with the Metropolitan Opera Guild, and has been a guest lecturer at the k-12 and university level. She also has a band with singer/songwriters Megan McCormick and Lincoln Gray, called Hatless In Public (insta: @hatlessinpublic).
Her work has been supported by OPERA America, New Georges, The Tank, New Ohio/IRT Archive Residency, New York Council on the Arts, Seattle Repertory Theater, Brown University/Trinity Rep, O’Neill Theater Center, Central Square Theater, and Powell Family Foundation. She’s had pieces commissioned by the Young New Yorker’s Chorus and the New Ohio/IRT Archive Residency. She is a two-time finalist for the Jonathan Larson Grant.
Growing up in Tacoma, Grace attended the Tacoma School of the Arts for high school, where she had a split concentration in vocal performance and songwriting/audio recording. While attending Tufts University (B.A. Music, minor in Italian Studies, summa cum laude), Grace collaborated as a performer, composer, sound designer and writer with the Tufts Department of Drama and Dance, the Tufts Opera Ensemble, Pen, Paint & Pretzels, Bare Bodkin Theatre Co., Torn Ticket II, and Hype! Mime Troupe, among others. While at Tufts, she won the Tishler Award for her performance in classical voice. She also participated in the Tufts Summer Scholars program (Schwartz-Paddock Family Fellowship) and received the Mabel Daniels Prize in Music and Literature for her thesis, the first iteration of A DOLL’S HOUSE: A NEW OPERA.
