Listen to musics from the Silk Road

(Listen to a Macedonia folk song 'The Evil Grandpa' (Лош дедо, Losh dedo) performed by Aashti)

Because of my own interest as well as the necessity of collecting materials for my lectures on Musical Cultures Around the Globe, I have been studying musics of Central Asia, Middle East and the Balkans for the past two years. Recently I have collaborated with some groups such as Shantaal, Aashti and London Shamisen Club to promote in Taiwan musics from those distant lands.

While the musicians of the said groups deliver 'exotic' songs and pieces with instruments unfamiliar to Taiwanese ears, I offer the audiences some guiding comments on musical works, instruments and cultural histories. Last Thursday I was invited to host a live performance by Aashti at the Tsing Hua University.

Aashti is a group composed of six members, including three Taiwanese, two Macedonians and a Frenchman, who met at the Silk Road concert series organised by Taipei Chinese Orchestra in 2008. These individuls soon found common ground on the penchant for musics from the ancient Silk Road and decided to form a ensemble.

It might be curious how musics from the Silk Road are connected with Taiwanese, Macedonian and French musicians. In fact, the Silk Road is not a distinct highway but an extensive network of trade routes connecting East, South and Western Asia with the Mediterranean world, which also covers part of North Africa and Europe.

Therefore, the French flautist who masters the kaval, the singer and the tambura player from Macedonia, and three Taiwanese who play respectively the Uyghur satar, the tablah and the Persian Zarb are certainly representatives of the musical Silk Road.

As opposed to Western classical music, of which the repertoire has been well studied and for which listening guidance is available virtually everywhere, musics (either folk or classical) from the Silk Road are still new to the Taiwanese audience, perhaps as well as to those in the 'West'. I hope with our efforts people in Taiwan may come to know more about the musical cultures from this ancient network of trade routes.

Two cartoons: Ensemble and Orchestra

(L'ensemble Instruemntal Paul Poulignot, Jean-Jacques Sempé, image from delcampe)

About 12 years ago, when I was still a postgraduate student at NTU, I was once intrigued by a picture titled L'ensemble instruemntal Paul Poulignot by the French cartoonist Jean-Jacques Sempé. Despite the small number of musicians and incorrect instrumental combination, I believe this picture to be a representation of an 'orchestra' which has just delivered Maurice Ravel's famous one-movement orchestral piece Boléro.

In this work, the snare drum has to tapped out the unchanging rigid ostinato (as illustrated below), while maintaining the rhythmic pattern and creating a steady crescendo, throughout the whole piece for about fifteen minutes. Therefore, at the end of the performance a special compliment from the conductor and a thundering ovation from the audience are usually given to the percussionist who plays it.


(The snare drum ostinato in Boléro )

I saw a framed poster of this picture at a bookshop but couldn't afford it. Fanne bought it in secret and made it my 23^rd birthday gift in 1998.

Several years later, I was fascinated by another picture titled Orchestra, painted by another French cartoonist Jean-Jacques Loup (by coincidence, another Jean-Jacques). In this one, it is neither the percussionist nor any other member in the orchestra that is featured, but rather, a locksmith working on the grand piano while the orchestra, the choir and the organist are waiting on stage.


(Orchestra, Jean-Jacques, image from zooscape)

While I can find a touch of Boléro in Sempé's cartoon, I have no idea what is to be played on stage in Loup's picture. All I want is a poster but somehow this picture is only available in jigsaw, and a not-for-sale free poster only comes within every pack of jigsaw purchased. I have been hesitating whether I should spend 50 USD for a 2,000-piece jigsaw puzzle just for the complimentary poster.

I gave in last weekend. I'll just frame Loup's Orchestra and hang it beside Sempé's L'ensemble Instruemntal for the time being, and think about how to deal with the jigsaw in the far future.

The coincidence within a coincidence

I don't think it would be unusual at all to receive invitations to two different functions which are to be held on the same day, but it would probably be if there are three. It happens to me.

I've just got three wedding invitations from

1. A neighbour from Keelung, the harbour town where I was born and raised, and lived until 1997;
   
2. Ellen, one of the best friends I've ever made with during my doctoral study at the University of Stirling;
   
3. Monica, a former colleague of May at CommonWealth Magazine, whom I came to know and befriend through MSN, and who is going to marry May's brother.

All of the three weddings will take place on the 14^th of March.

My mum will take care of the one in Keelung and thus what really bothers me is to decide whether to go to Ellen's or to attend Monica's.

However, I suppose I will be able to look after both at the same time, because the two brides-to-be, Ellen and Monica, will be married in the same venue, Grande Luxe Banquet, though at two different halls. I may have to circulate back and forth between the two receptions.

It wouldn't be unusual to receive invitations to two weddings which are to be held on the same day, but it definitely is if the two will take place in the same venue. What a coincidence within a coincidence, isn't it?

'Say Forever'

(From left, Sophia, May, me and Justin, image courtesy of May)

I once host a programme about the musics in the Far East on Subcity Radio in Scotland in 2006. Apart from a wide range of 'traditional' genres, I also played some pops, mostly J-pop, K-pop and Mandopop, and sometimes popular music from Thailand and Vietnam. Whenever I needed advice on J-pop and Mandopop, May was always the person I would speak to.

It was through May that I came to know some interesting pieces. 'True Colors' (yes, Cyndi Lauper's classic) covered by Hajime Chitose (元 ちとせ) in her EP A Thousand Nights And A Thousand Days (千の夜と千の昼 Sen no yoru to sen no hiru) is and example and one of my favourites.

Hailing from Amami Oshima (奄美大島), Hajime sings in a style with distinctive falsetto effects characteristic of that region, which can be easily observed in her interpretation of 'True Colors'. Click through and listen to this unique covered version by Hajime Chitose.

In return for May's contribution to my programme, I recommended to her good vocal works I encountered over the Internet from time to time as well. I especially remember a Mandarin piece called 'Say Forever' by the then GoGo & MeMe (哥哥妹妹), a pair of brother and sister now renamed JS (Justin+Sophia).

'Say Forever' is a soliloquy of a forlorn person who sings on a snowy street while thinking of her past love, imagining he is touched by the voice and she is hugged tightly in his arms. In her view, being alone would not make her lonely, but missing him would make her lonesome.

Perhaps because of the snow in lyrics, it became a ritual for us to listen to 'Say Forever' at Christmas, although we first heard this song in March 2006, obviously long before the festive season.

There are still ten months until Christmas, but I upload it to my new iPod Classic, which Fanne bought for me on a business trip to Australia when Australian Dollar hit five-year low, and play it repeatedly.



I was invited to a party hosted by MSN Taiwan to celebrate its tenth anniversary in Taiwan. What a pleasure it was to meet JS there in person. However, except 'Say Forever', I've never heard any other work of JS. I will check out more of their new works and attend their gig in April.

Article published in Apple Daily

(Apple Daily, 10 February 2009)

Urged by Allen, Fanne's brother-in-law, I submitted to Apple Daily (蘋果日報 Pingguo ribao) an article about Chang Loo (張露), a legendary Chinese singer who launched her singing career after making her recording debut for EMI (China) in 1941 and had been active in Hong Kong from 1952 when she resettled there until the mid 1970s. Chang passed away on the Chinese New Year's Day.

Chang Loo sang in a few languages, including Mandarin, English and Japanese, and had been capturing the fascination of the Chinese audience with her vivacious and versatile numbers for decades. She also covered many Japanese and English hits throughout her singing career in Hong Kong, among which was the classic 'Give Me A Kiss' (給我一個吻 Gei wo yige wen), adapted from Georgia Gibbs & The Yale Brothers' 1953 hit 'Seven Lonely Days'.

Had it not been for Allen, I wouldn't have written such an item for a newspaper. I suppose it would be vital for me to produce more academic papers rather than contribute articles to the press, since nowadays main measures of research performance are academic publications and citations, no matter whether the measurement is accurate and fair.

However, with respect to financial rewards and self-promotion, it might be worthwhile to spend a couple of hours in draughting a short article and have it published in a newspaper which circulates throughout the whole country.

Apple Daily, a national paper in the broadsheet format printed in Taiwan but owned by the Hong Kong-based Next Media Limited which publishes Apple Daily in Hong Kong, is usually perceived as a tabloid. Even though Apple Daily tends to be dominated by striking headlines, sensational stories and photographs, it gives commentaries on current issues and useful consumer information as well. It has the largest circulation, over 500,000 copies per day, among all newspapers in Taiwan.

It may not be as exciting as it was in 2005 when my first-ever research paper was published in Popular Music, a peer-reviewed academic journal dedicated to research on popular music, but it feels good.

For readers who do not read Chinese, please just listen to Chang Loo's 'Give Me A Kiss', and if you are interested, click through for the original English version of 'Seven Lonely Days' and make a comparison of the singing styles and instrumental arrangements.

Two terms after I started the course

I suppose it is of utmost importance that a teacher/lecturer/professor offers students constructive comments when marking their papers. Just as, when I was an undergraduate, I always hoped to receive from professors remarks on merits and shortcomings of my writings as well as instructions on how to improve them, so would my students, I believe, expect from me more practical comments on their term papers apart from the two-digit marks.

I have been reading and grading students coursework, 40 ten-page papers in total, during the Chinese New Year, which is still within the mourning period for Grandpa. Partly because of the aforementioned belief and partly because of the problem of obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD), I felt compelled to offer at least 200 characters (actually twice the amount most of the time, i.e. half an A4 page) for each paper in a well-written manner. Thus, I worked even on the eve, first day and second day of the new year and finished the task on the third day of the new year.

Plagiarism is always the problem. It is nowadays all too convenient to google, copy and paste, without further assessing the validity, credibility and authority of online information. While some of the students would rephrase what they found to avoid the unpardonable crime of 'copy-and-paste', others simply assume that a lecture or professor is too busy to surf through the Internet and thus so oblivious to what has been posted in the cyber world.

I wonder whose responsibility it should be to teach those undergraduates how to rephrase, to quote and to include all required information in footnotes or endnotes as well as in the bibliography. Should I, a part-time assistant professor and post-doctoral fellow, reserve ten minutes at the end of every lecture to introduce academic writing–Lesson One: Plagiarism Is A Crime?

Nevertheless, I am really delighted to see those who have made the most of my office hours complete their coursework and turn in good papers. I am particularly happy to know how much a student from the medical school, who started playing the Western classical violin since the age of 3, has learnt a lot through coursework as to how the violin, its music styles, fingering techniques and holding positions vary in different musical cultures around the globe.


(Holing positions of the violin in South Indian, top, and Morocco, bottom, demonstrated by Tiffanywan, photos reproduced from coursework)

Two terms after I started the course at National Taiwan University, I am glad to see some of my students truly come to know how to appreciate various musical cultures around the globe.

In memory of my late grandpa

I had been waiting for winter since last Christmas. As in Taipei it didn't fall below 10 °C until 10 January 2009, I suppose winter only came after the Gregorian New Year. I was happy to be greeted by the chilly wind blowing down streets and the wintry blast howling over the campus.

However, if only winter hadn't arrived.

My grandpa fell asleep at night on 12 January and didn't wake up, which probably had to do with the sudden drop in temperature. Grandpa passed away peacefully in bed at the age of 91 just before the Chinese New Year. For the first time in my whole life, I made a complaint about the low temp. If only winter hadn't arrived this year, he would live longer to see Wei II or Fanne II next year or the year after.

Grandpa was cremated on 21 January after a memorial service attended by more than 70 family members. He has seen his family grow and prosper, and his children and grandchildren achieve in many aspects of life, and thus in Taiwanese terms, he should be pleased to breathe his last without regrets.

Contemplating his image in the photo during Chinese New Year, I think of Grandpa profoundly.


It was taken on my late great grandmother's ninetieth birthday in 1988, when I was only 13. Forty family members in total were present here, excluding those from my granduncle's, and from left to right at the centre of the front row were my late grannie, great grannie and grandpa.

Three new-year images in a row

(Click to enlarge and compare: left to right, a newly-employed postdoctoral fellow, a fresh Doctor of Philosophy and an anguished student)

Well recognised as the nation's most expected New Year's Eve highlight, the 188-second fireworks display launched from the Taipei 101 Tower heralded the arrival of a new year last night for the fifth time in a row.

The Tourism Bureau, the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Chunghwa Telecom together won the bid for the right to stage the pyrotechnic show this year. In order to romote tourism and raise Taiwan's international profile, along with the show were TAIWAN, embedded in four green, red, blue and yellow hearts, illuminated on each side of the building respectively, with the notion of 'embracing Taiwan with great love'.

While the idae of TAIWAN and ♥ is slightly similar to last year's design, how about me? What do you think I have been doing? I hope Taipei 101 will keep alive this tradition and accordingly I will keep taking the new year photo and line up all the photos year by year.

At last, full-time job obtained by year end 2008

(Masthead of Taiwan Daily News, first issue, 6 May 1898)

At last, the project proposal I submitted is formally approved by the National Science Council, Taiwan – that is to say, I've just been offered a one year fixed term contract job.

The project intends to construct a database of articles and all the contents about music, including people, events, venues and objects, in Taiwan Daily News (臺灣日日新報 Taiwan ririxin bao), the longest continuously published newspaper from 1989 to 1944, almost the whole period of the Japanese rule over Taiwan. The database will provide valuable sources for studies on music history and any other musical subjects during the Japanese colonial period.

I will be working as a postdoctoral fellow at National Taiwan University in 2009, while teaching Musical Cultures Around the Globe there and another university, hosting radio programmes, composing for commercial films and so on to earn some more pocket money. Above all, with the materials collected and gleaned from Taiwan Daily News by project team members, I will also be able to examine the musical life of Taiwanese locals in the colonial era and carry out my own research.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Fanne is very much delighted to learn that I have eventually found a full-time job and one year's salary plus year-end bonus is guaranteed. Although Christmas is not a public holiday in Taiwan, and due to the economic downturn, it hardly feels Christmasy at all in Taipei, we just take this as one of the best Christmas gifts we've ever received.

Flamenco and popcorns with hot fruit tea

I have been lecturing on Music Cultures Around the Globe since the spring semester 2008 at National Taiwan University and recently been involved in organising the Friday Noon Concert Series of the College of Liberal Art.With some financial support granted by the Center for General Education, I can invite guest speakers to the course several times each semester, which helps me to maintain close contact with some excellent artists and performers in Taipei. Therefore, as an extension of the course Music Cultures Around the Globe, those musicians are also invited to the Friday concerts.

Yesterday we had a wonderful time with four artists from the Centro Flamenco Taiwan. Students and staff of the university gathered at the spacious entrance hall of the College of Liberal Art to be enthralled by the astonishing power of flamenco.

It was probably the best of the series this semester, I dare say. May even took the day off and managed to come to the performance, and after the show we went to the cinema, starting our weekend half a day earlier than others.

What I want to write down here is nothing about the film itself, which is too bland, though not to the extent of a flop, to be mentioned, but rather the bizarre combination of snack and drink we had – popcorns, half-sweet-half-salt, with hot fruit tea.

I suppose people usually have popcorns with carbonated soft drinks. Nevertheless, we don't need extra CO₂.

Despite the lackluster film and the odd food combination, we had a great early start of the weekend.