Grace Yu-Xin Zhao

Biography

Grace Zhao (she/her) is a management consultant from 9am to 9pm on weekdays and is otherwise a Chinese-American artist residing in Manhattan. While her current professional pursuits lie in 'financial midtown', she spends the rest of her time songwriting, arranging, writing, sketching, and diving into all things art - not to mention wielding a cleaver with the skill of a Chinese mother and cooking her favorite childhood dishes. She frequents open mics and can often be found sketching strangers on local trains.

Grace graduated from Princeton University with a bachelor of arts in economics and a minor in music theater, where she music-directed, conducted, orchestrated, and performed in several departmental and student group productions (Princeton Triangle Club). On campus, she was known for being a pianist, guitarist, and part-time accordionist, featured in several actor-musician shows (The Hello Girls; Sister Mok-rahn; Mother Courage and Her Children; Spring Awakening). At the heart of it all, she loves creating art with other people.

When she first joined the MAESTRA directory as a mentee and undergraduate student, she wrote the following, which still rings true today: "as an Asian American woman, I continually strive to broaden representation for marginalized voices; my greatest aspiration is to tell stories, either by writing and composing my own or by performing such roles, that deserve a greater platform amidst our western canon of predominantly white-American theater. Eager to learn more and excited to be plugged in with this amazing network of women!"