Pop Music Commands a Huge Audience Today: An Interview with the Young Composer Li Lifu

Pop Music Commands a Huge Audience Today: An Interview with the Young Composer Li Lifu Peter Micic, translator Monash University, Australia Translator's Introduction: Li Lifu ~~7C was born in Harbin, Heilongjiang Province in northeast China in 1953. During the Cultural Revolution he was 'sent down' to the countryside and worked with an army production team collecting folk songs. In 1976 he enrolled at the Heilongjiang Arts School majoring in the cello and composition. In 1980 he continued to study composition at the Shenyang Conservatory of Music under Qin Yongcheng ~~~ and Huang Weiqiang _ttsm. After graduating in 1983 he returned to Harbin and took up a position at the Heilongjiang Song and Dance Ensemble,. Li has written a number of highly acclaimed works for the media, films such as Kidnap(~JJl: Bangpiao), The deranged Songstress (.ff~:9: Fengkuang genii ), Hot and Cold, Measure for Measure (-~~?W71< ,-~~j(m Yiban shi haishui, yiban shi huoyan); television serials such as Black Button (»Amm Hei niukou) and Snow City (~~ Xuecheng). His major works for orchestra include the tone poem My Hometown (~f¥J*m Wodi jiaxiang), a wind quintet The Fox and the Crow (M~WA%~ Huli yu wuya), and an erhu concerto Uprising (~_ Qiyi). The following interview appeared in the 1989 Chinese Music Almanac (Zhongguo Yinyue Nianjian, p p. 335341 ). The actual interview was conducted in Beijing in late December 1988 by Mao Guo t!f@, a special correspondent for Chinese Music Almanac (rpf@~~~~ Zhongguo yinyue nianjian). As an interview, Li's somewhat piecemeal reflections on the pop'n'rock music scene may appear too casual, unpolished, perhaps even disjointed. We are not reading an essay or a piece of literary prose here--all we get are flashes and fragments. Li's perspective on pop'n'rock are that of an established songwriter and composer of popular music, and not of a star performer. In many respects, he observes the pop'n'rock scene in the late eighties from a distance, like a traveler sitting on a mountainside gazing into the valley below. In doing this translation I have tried to be as faithful to the original as possible, but in some cases I admit to using certain idiomatic English expressions where a literal Chinese translation would appear non sensical. I have chosen to CHINOPERL Papers No. 18 (1996) e 1996 by the Conference on Chinese Oral and Performing Literature, INC. CIDNOPERL Papers No. 19 translate this interview not because it contains startling insights into the pop'n'rock scene during the eighties but rather because there is a general paucity of such material available in English. Q: When the series Snow City was screened on Beijing's Central Television Station [CCTV] during the Spring Festival in 1987, it received nationwide acclaim. Some critics consider the music from the series to have achieved a new level of songwriting within the realm of pop music. You have subsequently gone on to become an influential composer for both film and television. How do you see the huge impact of the series? Li: I poured my heart and soul into completing Snow City. Let me say from the outset that this series is a work which expressed the past of my generation. Liang Xiaosheng ~~§IS novel deeply impressed and moved me. I spent eight years of 'reeducation' in the army in the Great Northern Wilderness and it is a story all too familiar to me. When I got hold of the script I was confident that I could write a good song. As far as I was concerned, it came down to re-examining that part of my life and experience. The gestation of writing [the music for] Snow City was especially long. As for the work, musically speaking, well that's another matter entirely. My approach is essentially an eclectic one. As long as it's good [music], I'll use it. In several songs from the series I melded elements from xintianyou ~7C~ (a genre of "mountain song" in northern Shaanxi Province), er'renzhuan =A" (a genre of" dance song" in the northeast of China), American country music and in some I have even incorporated elements from Peking Opera. I attempted to incorporate a number of disparate musical styles and thus create a distinctive style of my own. Such an approach, I think, produces a work of energy and vitality. I also employed a number of contemporary western songwriting techniques in the instrumentation. I began writing a highly individual piece of music, but the huge and unexpected success of Snow City prompted to me look at the influence of fllm and television music within the social milieu. The success of the songs from the series also came as a surprise. I've been part of 'the scene' for a number of years now, and there is no such thing as an overnight success. You have to be well versed not only with pop songs from Hong Kong and Taiwanese, but European and American pop styles as well. You then need to consider 'the scene' here and ask how one goes about developing pop music styles in China. I have written a number of works, but without this solid grounding, it would be unimaginable that I could have penned [the songs] The sun in my heart 96 Micic Popular Music (JL\tfl~::t~ Xinzhong di taiyang), and Can't Leave You (_1'00111\ Libukai ni). In the past, listeners were exposed to my music primarily via cassette tapes, but this kind of exposure pales into insignificance with the music from Snow City. Having said that, it would be unfair to judge my work on the merits of Snow City alone as if there was a moment of divine inspiration when I wrote the work. As I have repeatedly stated, I would prefer to talk about something else other than Snow City. Q: You have raise some important issues concerning the creative process of the composer. It is fair to say that the success of Snow City has had much to do with your development and maturity as a composer over the years. Please forgive me for mentioning it again, but I feel the popularity of the main theme song had as much to do with the lyrics as well as the song. Is true that you also took part in writing the lyrics. Can you comment on this? Li: The original lyrics of the main theme song were penned by the director, but I wasn't very happy with them. I subsequently made a number of changes because I feel that the lyrics to a song are very important. Lyrics play an integral role in the artistic quality and meaning of pop music and I spent a lot more time thinking about the lyrics than the actual song. Lyrical, if the song isn't good, I don't want to set it to music. Lyrics are neither .poetry nor philosophical sayings as such, but should use succinct and terse language to express both the sublime and the ridiculous. Take the lines 'It's Snowing, it's clearing up' from Snow City, for instance. They were used to describe the topsy turvy and chop and change policies during the Cultural Revolution. The unstable power politics of those chaotic times destroyed the human spirit. Everyone was affected. People did not know how to look after themselves. What else was there amid the chaos and destruction but a cultural desert? Just as we were learning the nuts and bolts of Newton's laws of mechanics in junior high we became the main driving force of the revolution. And what an honor it was to personally meet our great leader! As the Cultural Revolution continued on its destructive path, the working class became the vanguard of the revolution. We had no other choice but to join the ranks of the proletariat and we even dreamt of becoming part of the working class. But that was not enough. We were later 're-educated' by the peasants. 'Chairman Mao waved his hand, and I marched forward.' Legions of armies trekked across the Great Northern Wilderness. What could we do? Nothing! The soldiers in our corps could not make head or tail of these endless directives. When we finally woke up from our reverie and returned to the cities we discovered that everyone had 97 CHINOPERL Papers No. 19 forsaken us. We were too old to go to school, we lagged behind the latest technological developments, and we were not entitled to any kind of compensation. All we could do was wait and be assigned to some boring job. What kind of life was this? We were reduced to nothing. The policies of that period not only affected my generation, but everyone in China as well. Even Chairman Mao was reduced to a sense of bewilderment after spending his entire life 'devouring absolute power and authority.'l I've encapsulated the turmoil and confusion of that period in those couple of lines from the song. These are my own thoughts and recollections of that period. Hmmm, I've already said too much. I shouldn't be meddling in politics. If I can return to your question, lyrics are very important. After writing Snow City I turned my hand again to writing for film and television and I spent a lot of time over the lyrics. Q: I appreciate your candidness. There's a lot of food for thought in the lyrics to Snow City. But there are other things as well. Just before Snow City was screened, the northwest wind was sweeping across parts of China and The sun in my heart can be viewed as a part of the northwest wind fad. Some say that the 'northwest wind' became even more popular after The sun in my heart. Do you agree? What in your opinion, was the catalyst of the northwest wind ? Li: That's a very good question. I've already commented on the music from Snow City. Writing the music from for the series, I was conscious of many styles. When the northwest wind come along, I guess, I was also influenced in some way. There's nothing odd about this. As for musical styles, it's hard to stick labels on The Sun in My Heart. I won't deny that it is an indigenous pop/rock genre or that it is inextricably entwined to the northwest wind culture. But if you think I only wrote Snow City because the 'northwest wind' was the flavor of the month or that the success of the song had a lot to do with the huge popularity of the northwest wind, you are greatly mistaken. You just can't write a song in the northwest wind style and expect it to be a mega hit overnight. What is even more amusing is that many are predicting what the next pop'n'rock 'fad' will be once the 'northwest wind' has blown over. Many are suggesting that we should brace ourselves for a 'southeast wind' or a 'northeast wind'. What people think in society does have an impact on the cultural phenomenon of popular music. Repression has been a way of life for the Chinese for so many years. Everyone needs to scream and shout and let themselves go. It's like 1 Qitun shanhe: [devour mountains and rivers], describing someone fearless and courageous. 98 Micic Popular Music stamping your feet vigorously after returning home from a snowy day. The 'northwest wind' gives people an opportunity to let their hair down. If I may elaborate a bit further. The Chinese have a sense of loss, like a lost child. All day long, the child is watched and controlled. Naturally, the child comes to hate the father; but if the father was to drop dead the next day, there would be a dreaded fear of the unknown. Nietzsche was thinking along similar lines when he said, 'God is dead. We must make our own arrangements.' The Chinese have now reached this stage. In the past, it was Mao who was in control. If he said go east, the entire nation did so. If he said go west, we did as well. What about now? Well, nobody knows where we're heading. And this sense of loss can be found not only among middle school students, but middle-aged and elderly as well. We need the courage and confidence to find ourselves again. In the current malaise. the 'northwest wind' is bound to be popular. Q: In light of what you have just said, you have talked at length on the development of popular music. What do you think, then, of the general state of Chinese popular music and what of its developments and trends? Li: You've raised some very interesting questions. If you've been following the pop scene for the past decade, the development of pop music in China has ebbed and flowed, and various pop genres have continued to linger and h';lve yet to vanish into obscurity. But once a style emerges it just doesn't vanish into thin air. Music Associations as well as the Ministry of Culture have been watching the pop scene very closely. How do various pop genres continue to survive? They survive through a process of hybridization which has always existed in the most technologically advanced cultures in the world. America is a good example. It is a seething melting pot of cultures. Hong Kong and Singapore are also veritable melting pots and have shown a desire to move forward in the name of progress. Are we Chinese so stubborn that we continue to tenaciously cling to our five thousand years of history. Why. does pop music occupy so many markets around the world? Because of hybridization. And what of its future? Pop music will continue to hybridize: it comes down to separating, as it were, the wheat from the chaff. If we look back a decade ago at the rise of pop music weren't we listening to pop songs from Hong Kong, Taiwan and other parts of Southeast Asia? The first generation of pop stars all imitated Deng Lijun J$B~2 and Liu Wenzheng IUxIE and pop 2 Deng Lijun died on May 8, 1995 from respiratory problems developing from an asthma attack while on holiday in the northern Thai city of Chiang MaL She 99 CHINOPERL Papers No. 19 composers began their craft via the dissemination of cassette tapes. This first step seems to be an inevitable process in the creation of an indigenous pop music. Gradually, as composers and singers become familiar with various pop styles, they can pick and choose at their own discretion and create a style of their own. This is the product of' hybridization'. As for popular music today and its development, we first need to look at the composer. The standard of writing at the moment is nothing to write home about, but it's unrealistic to expect works to be consistently good throughout the China. It all starts with the composer and they only have themselves to blame. If you write a lousy work and you're unable to move your audience, how can you expected to compete with Hong Kong and Taiwanese pop music. On top of this, funds are scarce, audiences cannot appreciate your music and music associations don't really want to know you. It's so unfair. The audience is only one side of the picture. They're cunning and shrewd. But you should always be one step ahead. You should take to heart the credo: 'the cunning fox can never outwit the skilled hunter'. Some of the composers in the pop music scene today are professionals such as Wang Ming .:Em,3 Gu Jianfen ~J£:~,4 and was eulogised by a number of Chinese magazines and newspapers across the Chinese Diaspora and The Standard in Hong Kong called her Asia's "voice that knew no borders." See Winnie Chung and Wanda Szeto 'Showbiz mourns Teng', South China Morning Post, May 10, 1995:1-2 See also Yongyuan de Deng Lijun [Deng Lijun Forever], a 64-page magazine published by the Huacheng Publishing Company, Canton in May that year and 'Sweetheart of the Army' in Huang Feng Yinggexing Yihenlu [Everlasting Sorrow of Film and Song Stars], Xiaobao wenhua chubanshe, Tabei, 1995:7-27. Among the plethora of records and cassette tapes paying tribute to Teng includes a very interesting compilation of her songs sung not by Cantopop singers but by mainland 'northern-style' rock bands and singers entitled Rock 'n'Roll's Farewell: Tribute to Teresa Teng (1995), jointly issued by audio visual and record companies in Hubei, Hong Kong and Beijing. 3 Born in Shanghai in 1934 In 1959 he entered the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and began learning composition under Ding Shande T~tfv graduating from the composition department in 1964. He has written extensively for film and television and at the Third Hundred Flowers Film Awards in 1980 his music for the Little Flower [Xiaohua] won the top film music award. Wang is attached to the Zhongyang Yuetuan in Beijing. 4 A native of Shandong province, Gu was born in Osaka, Japan in 1935. In 1952 she graduated from the composition department at the Northeast Specialized Music College in Jinzhou (the Shenyang Conservatory of Music's predecessor) and that same year she transferred to the Central Song and Dance Ensemble in Beijing. 100 Micic Popular Music Wang Liping .:EiL.ifZ who have been the mainstay of the pop music scene. Their familiarity with popular music styles from America, France and Japan has no doubt enriched their own creativity and style. Then there are the likes of Cui Jian mil,s GuoFeng ~lfI$ and Zang Tianshuo ~7CWl.6 They've been greatly influenced by lots of foreign things, take their music-making very seriously and have written a number of exciting new works. Technically, these songs lack maturity, but they are a force to be reckon with and have made a real impact on the pop'n'rock scene. There's yet another group who really don't belong anywhere, have no musical expertise and produced shoddy, inferior works We desperately need a group of technically skilled composers who take their profession seriously. Only after these problems have been resolved can be expect to see works of a high quality. We have to learn our craft from others, but we can't go around copying all and sundry. The second point concerns the creative process of writing a song. The development of lyrics begins with establishing a popular music style. Pop music plays an important role in society. It' s also a diversion and amusement for people. I'm referring in particular to the lyrics. Conversely, if you concentrate only on style, that won't resolve the problem either. Take rock'n'roll for instance. As a style of popular music, China has rock, but strictly speaking, China has no authentic rock 'n'roll because rock 'n' roll is much more than just a popular music genre. In Western democratic countries, rock'n'roll is a vehicle for youth who oppose orthodox culture and traditional morals. When the Beatles' performed live, ['m a Loser,- a song about a young girl, you would often see ten of thousands of people dancing and singing. Many problems in society are mirrored in rock'n'roll. 5 For a detailed and highly entertaining account of Cui Jian, see Zhao Jianwei, Cui ]ian zai yiwusuoyou zhong nahan: Zhongguo yaogun beiwanglu [Cui Jian shouting nothing to my name, in China's rock'n'roll memoire]. 6 Zang Tianshuo is the lead singer and keyboard player of 1989. Born in Beijing in 1964 Zang began playing the piano at the age of six. In 1983 with a group of kindred spirits (Yan Gang, Qin Qi, Li Ji, and Zhou Xiaohu) he formed the band The Wobbles [Budaoweng]. In 1995 he released his debut solo album titled Wo zhe shinian [My ten years] issued by the Shanghai Video Audio Company and includes his wildly popular song Pengyou [friends]. See Zhongguo Yinxiang [China audio visual], December 1995: 17-6. Li Lifu is no doubt making reference to the many who have been drawn into the lucrative pop/rock industry like moths to flames. They include those who produce what Geremie Barme has called liulnang [hooligan] music, 'shoccy recordings of often scurrilous songs by pengchong [studio insects] done for easy money.' See Barme 'Wang Shuo and Liumang culture' in The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, 1992:28-48, especially footnote 82. 101 ClllNOPERL Papers No. 19 The government gives you a bit of space and you left off some steam. This is conducive to the stability of the social order. In the future I see China following a similar path. However, the cart should not come before the horse: rock'n'roll transformed a metaphor of resistance into power and authority first, then harnessing the popular music genre came second. After borrowing from Western pop models we must therefore continue to work hard on the lyrics. And if we discover that Western popular genres don't really do anything for us we can find other popular music styles that will allow us to express the way we feel. But we haven't reached that stage yet. The third issue concerns the singers themselves. They lack many things: training and discipline, education and musical knowledge. Famous [pop 'n'rock] singers in the West compose their own songs, write their own lyrics, play the guitar and electronic piano. They are truly expressing their own creativity. Some say that our own pop 'n'rock stars cannot reach this level of creativity. This no doubt affects the whole level of pop music in China. Q: 1would like to ask you another question. You originally studied classical western music at the [Shenyang] conservatory of Music, then got involved in pop music. Don't you think the two contradict each other? What relationship do you see between western art music and popular music? Li: I've always loved the orchestral music of Beethoven, Brahms, Mahler, Rachmaninov, Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich and others. I never tire of listening to these masters. I must confess, I have a weakness for such music. It affects me deeply. I once aspired to be an orchestral composer and I wrote a symphony in three movements. It's all rather embarrassing. The symphony is very Ravelesque. To this day, my passion to compose symphonic music has not flagged. There's something sacred and sublime about orchestral music. In the last several years I've concentrated on pop music, but I've never lost interest in orchestral music. Some influential composers in Beijing have organized their own concerts and I've been to most of them and pondered several issues. Orchestral music has been regarded very highly in the past. Mter the Second World War, orchestral music went through a crisis of sorts. Bartok, Shostakovich and Ravel were absent from the repertoire for many years. A vante- garde works have alienated many listeners because they cater to a very small audience. But, pop music has moved in the opposite direction and spread like wild fire. Pop music today commands a huge audience and it's very much like what orchestral music used to be in the past. The We Are The World benefit concert sung in aid for African victims was a grand and momentous 102 Micic Popular Music occasion. Can we not compare such an event to Beethoven's Ode to Joy some 150 years ago? In this respect, I don't think I've been composing pop music in vain over the years, and I'll continue to do so. Q: Finally, I would like to ask you how many songs for film and television did you compose in 1988? Li: Eight Q: Do you think they will be as popular as 'Snow City?' Li: I don't know. Appendix: Lyrics to the song Xin zhong de taiyang JL\t:p1¥J:;t~[The sun in my heart} There's a sun in the sky, a moon in the water, I don't know, I don't know . Which is rounder, which is brighter. ~J:1f@*:~'*$ff~F1~' ~=f~Dm ' ~=f~Dm ' ~=f~Dm ' umOO£lIiI,umOO]l!~o There's a big tree down in the valley I don't know ..... Which is bigger, which is taller. llrF1f~*W ' ~=f~Dm ' ~=f~Dm ' fX::f~Dm ' om 00£* 'lTjJIH~]I! ~ 0 It's snowing, don't forget your quilted jacket. It's clearing, don't forget your straw hat. It's snowing, it's clearing. When it's snowing don't forget your quilted jacket. It's snowing, it's clearing. When it clears, don't forget your straw hat. ~~7'~~7' "F§7 ' ]ju~~m~ ' l'*~7'~~7' ~~ 7 ' ]jUZtttlit~~' 103 CHINOPERL Papers No. 19 There is someone I cherish in my heart; there is a wide world there outside. I don't know, I don't know ..... To which I belong. JL,r:p~OO~A ' ~?}~ll~ltltW. ' ~~~Dm ' ~~~Dm ' ~~~Dm ' tlGJJ!~j6TJi6TlI}JI{-OO° There's a sun in the sky, a moon in the water I don't know, I don't know . Which is rounder, which is brighter. 7CJ:~@~~,*r:pff~FJ~' fX1'~Dm ' ~~~[]m ' ~/f~[]lli ' lfjj}Hil!lm ' llJJ~OO£~0 Oh, the sun, the sun, . The sun in my heart. ~,*~,*~t 1I{ij,*~,*~, tlGJL\t:p B"J~~ 0 104 ...