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        The reasons given for the popularity of televised singing contests are numerous and debateable. Two obvious sources are the highly manufactured mass appeal of tongsu music and the general lack of interesting television programming. These, however, do not explain the extreme levels of enthusiasm demonstrated by viewers. A letter to CCTV by one viewer of the 1986 National Young Singers Contest evidenced the emotional response to the program.

        It was inspiring and fascinating to watch the contest televised live right from singing, interviewing, judging to prize-giving, at one go. The contest aroused heated debates among TV audiences, who feasted their eyes on beautiful sets and enjoyed it intensely." (158)

        Many viewers cited audience participation as motivating their interest in singing contests. A few programs regularly solicit viewers to watch and then send in their votes to the station, and then the audience votes are used to award the final prizes. One such contest, hosted by the Communist Youth League Central Committee, received votes from five million League members in 250,000 League branches. (159) Most contests, however, use judges and award prizes at the end of the show. Even with these, viewers are encouraged to participate at home, and family members vote amongst themselves along with the judges. A woman in Qingdao explained,

        We are a family of seven. We all joined the judges in grading, except the four-year-old granddaughter. We all applauded when we gave marks close to the judges! Our seven-year-old grandson demanded a prize from his Granny on the ground that he had given accurate marks. (160)

        The government, despite its initial discomfort with singing contests and popular music in general, issued its own set of reasons for supporting the tongsu contests. CCTV officials argued that the contests provided a uniquely effective form of musical education for the masses. According to Mao Bian in China Youth,

    Because of the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution, many young people lack of necessary musical knowledge. Music specialists have been most anxious about this state of affairs and have urged popularization of musical knowledge. (161)

        Although not likely what the musical specialists had in mind, tongsu music was rightly believed to be highly palatable music for the masses. Its familiar topics, musical and lyrical simplicity, and uniformity results in songs that are inoffensive and easy to memorize. Nevertheless, knowledge of tongsu provides very little basis for understanding and appreciating more complicated forms of music. One Beijing engineer argued otherwise.

        I was totally ignorant about music before. But I found the contest most enlightening. The program was as recreational as it was informative. I brushed aside my work in those evenings when the program was on. This was rare for me and perhaps the first time in recent years. (162)

        Despite the gla-mour and publicity that television singing contests offer, tongsu singers unanimously express a distaste for them, and many have described their experiences as upsetting and traumatic. A great deal of pressure is placed upon singers by their performance troupes, managers, and work units. A single contest can make or break a singer's career. Worse, though, are the personal and artistic compromises that the singers are expected to make for the contests.

        The primary requirement for female tongsu singers is that they be young and attractive, and the unequal power balance between singers and officials results in an atmosphere of pervasive sexual harassment. Even when the pressure is less malign, it takes a huge psychological toll on the performers. Singer Jing Gangshan explained her frustration with the absolute control exercised by television executives.

        Singing contests don't have anything to do with talent. I want to participate in them, but when I do I regret it. Maybe some official type will give someone a lot of money, and the points scored by the singers...it's no judge of talent anyway...Once I went on and they made me cut my hair before the show. I felt like I was being raped. (163)

        Another young woman, Hu Yue, who took first place at the 1988 Third National Tongsu Song Contest, described a similar response to her experiences.

        I cried. My stomach was in knots. I couldn't speak. This was the first time a singer every cried on live TV, but I couldn't control myself, I was overwhelmed with resentment. I had to sacrifice so much, put out so much...feelings that are particularly easy for a woman to be sensitive to. But I can't tell you any more about those things, because I'm still working in tongsu music circles... A lot of other singers saw what happened to me that time, saw my humiliation, but they still want to participate, just to get famous. It's an opportunity they can't pass up. Even if they lose, they'll still be exposed to a huge audience. (164)

        The structure of the singing contests and their effects on singers is indicative of the position of the individual performer within the tongsu industry. Singers lack any control over where, how, what and when they perform. Virtually every aspect of their professional lives are dictated by their troupe or work unit. The singers are not so much celebrities as commodities, and most have expressed feelings of alienation from their work. Tongsu singer An Dong explained the role of the performer.

        Concerts and recordings are sometimes organized by the troupe. If so, you are required to sing. They pay very little, just five yuan a night. Of course, all the profits go to the unit. The unit exploits the workers...and they don't care about the development of your career, they don't help you make a name for yourself in the pop world...In fact, the only thing the troupe does care about is overseeing the content of my performances and recordings. Since most of the leaders are older, their tastes lean toward folk songs and not more westernized pop songs. So if your program is all pop with no folksy touches, you will incite their disapproval and be cut down. Censorship is particularly strict in our unit because it's military. (165)

        In addition to the complaints of its participants, the tongsu genre has been the target of severe criticism from all angles of the ideological spectrum. Musical critics within China and abroad point out its stylistic shortcomings, the uniformity of its melodies, and the lack of creativity of its lyrics. Alternative Chinese musicians tend to dislike the official restrictions placed on the tongsu industry and the conformity of the music it produces. Liberals express discomfort with the heavy-handed ideological content of many tongsu songs. Internationally, the numerous critics of "Canto-pop" have similarly weighed in against its mainland incarnation. Some foreigners have even found tongsu offensive, and have denounced it as a "tacky" and "schizophrenic" hybrid which combines the very worst elements of both Chinese and Western culture, and simultaneously erodes the far superior elements of traditional culture. (166)

        Ideological conservatives within the Party and advocates of older musical styles have stood in opposition to tongsu. They consider tongsu, "harmful...vulgar in contents, inartistic in melodies, affected and unnatural in performance and full of shouting and yelling." (167) Older Chinese frown upon the romantic and sometimes suggestive, and compare it to the "yellow music" of the 1920's and 1930's. Elderly Party cadres understandably consider the glamorized consumerism associated with tongsu music an affront to both traditional and Maoist values. Conservative dislike of tongsu music was evident during the Spiritual Pollution campaigns, when all but the most ideologically blatant songs and their writers were criticised.. However, once tongsu music entered the mainstream, it became a well established cultural institution, partly due to its popular appeal and partly because the Party saw it as a means of preempting more potentially subversive musical forms.

        Despite the controls placed upon the tongsu industry, songwriters have been able to some creative control over their products, and develop a handful of innovative stylistic trends within the genre of tongsu. These were all derived aspects from Chinese history or cultural tradition and merged them with modern musical styles. One of these, the so-called "Red Beats" movement, revived old revolutionary songs and set them to a loud, heavy disco beat. Revolutionary Disco was first introduced to the Chinese public during the 1986 television broadcast of the annual Spring Festival Gala, a New Years song and dance contest watched by an estimated 300 million people. The music was considered controversial at the time for its use of Jiang Qing's model Revolutionary Operas, which had been under a ten-year ban. The music performed at the Spring Festival Gala was the result of collaboration between composers Wen Zhongjia and Qiao Yu and singer Mei Baojiu, son of famous opera singer Mei Lanfang. They took a number of Revolutionary and traditional Beijing Operas and set them to the new musical style described as, "electronic sound effects underlined by an incessant, loud and tinny simulated drumbeat, and what sounds very much like video game fireworks." (168) Qiao Yu desribed his motivation for tapping into operatic sources:

      It would be so exciting if by means of our experimentation and efforts we could develop a new range of musical possibilities: something that is both a continuation of the past but also a fresh stage of development; both ancient and strikingly new; something that is historically identifiable and at the same time being completely contemporary. (169)

        Wen and Qiao's cassette Mismatched Medley became hugely popular and could be heard played in discotheques, subways, taxis, and restaurants throughout China.(170) The tongsu industry capitalized on its popularity, and an array cassettes offering revolutionary songs set to a disco music were released in the ensuing years. Part of the broader enthusiasm for disco music in China in the 1980s, revolutionary disco also figured in the kitsch of the "Mao craze" of the middle and late 1980s, which some attributed to a misdirected sense of nostalgia for earlier and supposedly simpler times. Regardless of its origins and motivations, "Red Beats" and Maoist nostalgia represented some of the stranger directions in Chinese popular culture.

        Another innovative direction within the tongsu industry was the style known as "jail" or "educated youth" songs. The lyrical content of style drew upon the experiences of prisoners and of the youth sent down to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution. "Jail songs" became popular in 1988 through 1989. With their lyrics detailing alienation and bitter disillusion, they proved most popular with the getihu, or independent small business-owners. The getihu claimed that the jail songs captured the sense of marginalization that they felt defined their own lives.(171)

        The most significant opposition trend within tongsu was the Xibei Feng, or "Northwest Wind" music. Xibei Feng merged more traditional Chinese music with modern music. It adapted old folk songs, or imitations of old folk songs, to the dominant style of musical accompaniment drawn from Gangtai music. Drawing upon the lyrical content of folk music as well a raspy, rough vocal delivery, but performed with modern instruments, rhythms, and recording technology, Xibei Feng was widely heralded as the first indigenous popular music.(172) It was praised in Renmin Riban,

        [Xibei feng ] takes modern western rock music - typically popular music produced under highly industrialized conditions - and Chinese folk musical culture - typically a musical culture held back by confined and insular cultural conditions - to produce Xibei Feng: a sinicized rock music.(173)

        Xibei Feng emerged in the late 1980s, and was often associated with the fad of "root-seeking" and cultural reflection, which turned towards an idealized interpretation of traditional culture and society with the same sort of misplaced nostalgia as directed the revival of "Mao kitsch." Emblematic of the "root-seeking" movement were the films of the so-called "fifth generation" of Chinese filmmakers. Although the majority of "fifth generation" films attracted little popular interest, their soundtracks, from which most of the early Xibei Feng songs were taken, were given extensive play on the radio and sold well.

        The folk themes of Xibei Feng recall the idyllic, peasant setting of the Northwest plains. The lyrics and music express the deep ambivalence that many Chinese feel towards their peasant roots. The songs redress the less savory aspects of peasant life in feudal society; for example, a number expressed the laments of young peasant women trapped in unhappy, patriarchal, arranged marriages. (174) This was the case in one of the most popular Xibei Feng songs, "Sister, Go Bravely Forward" (Meimei, ni dadan de wang qian zou), which was taken from the soundtrack of the film, Red Sorghum. It was composed by tongsu songwriter Zhao Jiping, and it lyrics were produced by Yang Fengliang in conjunction with Zhang Yimou, the film's director.

        Hey! Sister, go bravely ahead, ah!
Go forward, don't turn back your head
The great road that connects with the sky
Nine thousand, nine hundred, nine thousand, nine hundred, nine, ah!

From now on, you'll be building a red bridal tower, ah!
Tossing a red bridal ball, ah!


Hitting me right on the head, ah!
I'll drink a pot with you, ah!
Red red sorghum wine, ah!(175)

        A number of Xibei Feng songs were denounced in 1987 and 1989 for their reconstruction of the feudal past. It was, however the very same reason provided the source of its overwhelming popularity with the Chinese audience. A number of Chinese interviewed expressed this sentiment in Brace (1991).

        Xibei Feng is Chinese pop music, the other forms are not - they are foreign styles.

        It represents Chinese music. Xibei Feng speaks directly of the realities of life in mainland China.

        The melodies of Xibei Feng come from the people of China, the lyrics speak of the hardships of daily life in China, and the vocal style is also of the people. (176)

       

        One such musician, Zhang Hang (or Zhang Xing) in 1984 competed in the televised annual Shanghai Guitarist Competition. (177) His performance, in the words of one admirer, "spiced up warmed over Taiwanese and Hong Kong pop ballads with a dash of rock n' roll grit and sexual innuendo." (178) Zhang rose to instant fame, and his cassette There's More than One Way to Make It, featuring songs such as the country-western inspired ballad Chidao (Too Late) and a rendition of John Denver's Country Road, became a best-seller. (179)

        Zhang Hang was the first unconventional Chinese musician to rise to fame and popularity. This alone was sufficiently problematic for the Party, worsened by the degree to which sexuality was hinted at in the lyrics, rhythms, and performance of his music. In addition, the rock music scene tended to be sexually promiscuous by Chinese standards, incurring even greater government suspicion. On 11 November 1985, Zhang was arrested in Shanghai on charges of "hooliganism", partly due to the government definition of sex by persons under the legal age of twenty-one as rape. According to the Xinhua news agency,

        With cassette tape sales of 700,000 copies, the musician had become famous. Long before this he had raped an infant girl and began to run wilder after he became famous. Thinking that he enjoyed nationwide fame and had strong backing, [Zhang] asserted that the "law was on his side".(180)

        Although Zhang Hang was released not long after his arrest, his music was banned and he vanished from the public eye. However, he represented the beginning of the trend that would develop in the following few years of Chinese rock and roll, or yaogun music. Zhang's mildly suggestive love ballads paled in comparison to the rebellious musical and lyrical style of yaogun . By 1986, however, even many tongsu songs reflected the influence of musical styles such as Zhang's. Underground rock musicians, many playing covers of American songs in foreign owned bars and clubs in Beijing, were able to cultivate their alternative genre of music despite government disapproval and occasional interference.

        Yaogun music was distinguished from tongsu by a number of factors. Musically, yaogun resembles Xibei Feng with its rough vocal delivery, which contrasts with the smooth, open sound of Gangtai-based tongsu.(181) As many yaogun musicians proudly point out, they write and perform their own songs. It lacks the division of labor that characterizes the production of tongsu. For the most part, yaogun singers are members of bands, and collaborate on all aspects of composition and performance. They operate largely independently of the state music industry. The structure of yaogun gives it a great deal of freedom in terms of both musical style and content, and the often opposition or alienated lyrics of their music reflect this. Yaogun music also reflects and partially developed out of the broader youth culture of "hooliganism" that developed in a number of China's urban centers, particularly in Beijing.

        The limited trickle of Western music, such as songs by the hugely popular John Denver, continued to influence a number of young musicians. Among them was a young trumpet player in the Beijing Philharmonic Orchestra who would, within a few years, rise to stardom as the father of Chinese rock music. Born in 1961 to an ethnically Korean musical family, Cui Jian learned to play the trumpet at age 14, and in 1981 he joined Beijing Philharmonic. (182) During his first few years there, Cui Jian began to be exposed to Gangtai music, as well as the songs of John Denver, Andy Williams, and Bing Crosby. In 1982 Cui Jian and other members of the Beijing Philharmonic formed a band called "Trail" to perform cover versions of these and similar musicians. (183) In 1985, Cui Jian and others from the Symphony Orchestra launched another band, called "Seven-Ply Board," later renamed the "ADO Band," and they began writing and performing their own songs. (184)

        Cui Jian was one of the first Chinese singers to write his own songs, and he drew upon the styles of his early influences, but remained unhappy with the product.(185) In the mid 1980's, the selection of Western music available in China started to broaden. The music of American pop icons such as Michael Jackson and Madonna dominated the market, and "classic" rock and pop was imported as well. In 1985, Cui Jian began listening to groups such as the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Simon and Garfunkle, and the Police. The following year he drew upon those new influences to write, Yi wu suo you (I have nothing), which would become the foundation of both Cui Jian's career and the entire genre of Chinese Rock. (186)

        The following year, Cui Jian performed Yi wu suo you on "A Hundred Pop Stars". The rasping vocals, varying beat and unusual style of Yi wu suo you, combined with the melancholy disillusionment of its lyrics turned the song into an instant hit. Its musical style is described as consisting of a,

        ...pinched, rough vocal style; a foregrounding of rhythmic elements, both in the accompaniment (which borrows heavily from Western Rock music) and in the melody; a melodic construction which is taken to be closely related to northern folk song melodic content; and occasional use of traditional Chinese instruments, such as the suona (a reed instrument), the dizi (a transverse flute made of bamboo), and the guzheng (a zither).(187)

        Although it was not released as an album until 1989, bootleg copies of the song circulated extensively, particularly around the Beijing student, artist and foreign communities. (188) The rise of Cui Jian was viewed with ambivalence by the Party. On one hand, the content of Yi wu suo you was not blatantly political, and it the sexual undertones were mild in comparison even to many tongsu songs. The actual significance of the lyrics, as repeated below, has been subject to debate; however, even when it is considered merely a love song, the suggestion that a youth in Communist China would have nothing was considered insulting and dangerous by the Party.

    I've asked you tirelessly, when will you go with me?
But you just always laugh at my having nothing
I've given you my dreams, given you my freedom
But you always just laugh at my having nothing
Oh! When will you go with me?

        The earth under my feet is on the move,
The water by my side is flowing on,
But you always just laugh at my having nothing
Why haven't you laughed your fill?
Why will I always search?

        Could it be that before you I will always have nothing?

        I'm telling you I've waited a long time
I'm telling you my very last demand
I need to grab both your hands
Only then will you go with me
That's when your hands will tremble
That's when your tears will flow
Can it be that you're telling me you love my having nothing? (189)

        Despite his tenuous official standing, Cui Jian performed at a handful of other concerts during 1986. The following year, however, brought the second Party crackdown on what were considered bad influences within the Party and throughout society. Cui Jian was among the numerous targets of campaign against "bourgeois liberalism". He was fired from his job at the Beijing Philharmonic, and prohibited from holding concerts or performing on television. Nevertheless, 1988 witnessed a relaxation of the restrictions upon yaogun musicians. The ADO Band and other yaogun groups were allowed to perform a handful of concerts.

        Cui Jian was the first, but he was by no means the only budding rock musician in Beijing in the late 1980's. Despite the government crackdown, 1987 marked a seminal year for Chinese rock. In addition to Cui Jian's televised performance, and a number of noteworthy music groups were formed and began to perform, forming the first wave of Chinese rock musicians. The majority of this first wave of musicians similarly found their musical origins in the fine performing arts or in tongsu music, but were lured away by their frustration with the state controlled music industries and by their fascination with the innovative styles found in Western music.

        The influence of Western rock'n'roll can be distinctly seen in yaogun music. The imitation, however, is joined by a large degree of adaptation and interpretation as musicians blend Western rock with their indigenous influences. As explained in China Youth, the alterations in style resulted partly from the scarcity of musical equipment available in China.

        Rock'n'roll abroad is notoriously loud. But Chinese rock'n'rollers are not as rich as those in other countries and they cannot afford first-class sound facilities to produce loud music. They have neither huge showplaces that can easily accommodate singers and audience, nor the social environment and cultural background of singers in other countries. But they have never lost their nerve. They started to find a new form of rock'n'roll that best suits China and Chinese tastes.(190)

        Yaogun's synthesis between Western rock and traditional Chinese music also resulted from the musical background and training of its musicians. Most began their musical careers either in performing Western classical music or in playing traditional Chinese instruments. For example, in the ADO Band, in addition to Cui Jian's background on the trumpet, saxophonist Liu Yuan also played the Suona, a traditional Chinese trumpet, and the Dongxiao, a traditional flute. Another band member played the Guzheng, a stringed instrument. These instruments were used in Cui Jian's music along with drums and guitars, contributing to the uniqueness and appeal of his music. Many other musicians in the first wave of yaogun utilized similar combinations. (191)

© L. Movius, April 1998
Please do not cite without permission.
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