text: Gabriel released another live album in 1998, En la Plaza de Toros México, a 30-track boxed set. That same year she traveled to Miami to work with the renowned producer Emilio Estefan, Jr., on her 1999 album Soy Como Soy. The result was a pop-influenced ranchera album that went gold in the Latin music market and helped Gabriel win the Ritmo Latino Music Award for Female Pop Artist of the Year in 2000.
  With the release of Eternamente in 2000, Gabriel returned to mariachi love ballads, using only guitar as accompaniment. That same year she also appeared with other Mexican music icons in an Independence Day television special called Viva Mexico, a celebration of Mexican music and history. In 2001 Gabriel released Huelo a Soledad, once again balancing the traditional sounds of Eternamente with sophisticated pop songs, a cappella numbers, and dance tracks.
  In 2002, Gabriel's platinum-selling album Sagitario was released. In that same year, she won the Billboard Latin Music Estrella Award in recognition of her contribution to the Latin music industry, performed at a tribute concert for Vicente Fernandez sponsored by the Latin Music Awards, and participated in the ninth annual Las Cruces International Mariachi Concert and Festival in New Mexico. In December of that year, she was scheduled to perform at the eleventh annual Christmas Mariachi Festival in Phoenix, Arizona, but was denied a work visa and refused entry into the United States.