Chinese Songs

June 16, 2010 1:37 PM

I'm learning Chinese (I'm just a beginner) and I'd like some music to listen to. Songs with clear vocals in Mandarin Chinese, preferably indie rock/pop, are what I'm looking for. I'm not familiar with many Chinese singers or groups though. So, any suggestions?
posted by wyn to Writing & Language (15 answers total)

I have no idea how clear the words are to someone trying to understand them, and some of her songs are in a made-up language, but Sa Ding Ding sings in Mandarin at least some of the time, and is quite lovely
posted by gregjones at 2:02 PM on June 16, 2010

For learning new languages, I find foreign dubs of Disney songs to be useful. Many of them can be found on YouTube.
posted by ambulatorybird at 2:15 PM on June 16, 2010

I quite like Liang Jing Ru, or apparently, "Fish Leong". (Seriously? What?) In particular: Calm Summer.

Another singer who comes to mind is Meng Ting Wei, who was really popular in China about ten-fifteen years ago, and whose style definitely reflects that:
A cloud made of rain in the wind
Look at the Face of The Moon

Also look into Teresa Teng's stuff, though she has songs in Cantonese and Japanese as well. She's even more dated, but she's one of, if not the most beloved singers in China:
The Moon Represents My Heart
A Thousand Words

Another song off the top of my mind with clear enunciation (though I can't vouch for the artist): Scattered Flight, which is neat for its very obvious Asian tones.

A lot of Chinese pop songs tend to be very ballad-y. I find it seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it situation. I'm much more familiar with recent bands, though they tend to be more mumbly.

Tip: A lot of popular songs are turned into Karaoke. If you know your Kanji at all, it might be useful following along on Youtube so you see which character is being pronounced, given how many homonyms there are in Chinese.

I'll come back if I think of anything else, let me know what you think of these.
posted by Phire at 2:21 PM on June 16, 2010

Stephanie Sun! this and this for some samples but most of her music is good.
posted by raw sugar at 2:22 PM on June 16, 2010

For something less poppy, try a couple of songs like these:

阴三儿，北京晚报 (Rap).

Carsick Cars - 他们的一员 (Indie rock).

优酷 (the Chinese youtube: literally "Supercool") is always cool to browse around.

Neocha/新茶 is a nice portal to keep an eye out for new stuff coming out of China.

Beijingdaze is a blog that covers a lot of the music scene in Beijing, which should point you in the right direction.
posted by flippant at 3:07 PM on June 16, 2010 [3 favorites]

If you want to see the wonders of the Asian Karaoke Experience, go no further than

啤酒它顶呱呱 ("Beer is top notch"). He goes on to describe the smoking of cigars, the wearing of Western dress and finally the wifey and himself as Top Notch.
posted by flippant at 3:12 PM on June 16, 2010

Since mandarin is a tonal language (linguistics), music isn't going to help in that aspect. Westerners always have a ton of problems getting the right tones in spoken mandarin. Just so you know.
posted by Ky at 5:52 PM on June 16, 2010

This last.fm group might be useful.
posted by vanitas at 7:16 PM on June 16, 2010

Stephanie Sun Yan Zi is definitely the first to come to mind. She isn't indie pop/rock but her music isn't the typical cpop imo. As Phire mentioned, Chinese songs do tend to be more ballady. Many of Stephanie's songs are slow and it's easier to pick out words. As someone who had to relearn Mandarin during college, I'm able to pick out whole phrases/sentences in her songs.
posted by vilandra at 8:41 PM on June 16, 2010

these are karaoke staples from the last 5 years:

ballad pop
wang leehom: kiss goodbye
guang liang: tong hua
jay chou: coral sea
landy/jacky: wu ding

more upbeat pop
rainie: wan mei
cyndy wang: honey
jolin: agent j

should be able to find chinese and pinyin subtitles
posted by alex3005 at 9:17 PM on June 16, 2010

I find that the way 张震岳 sings makes it very easy to understand at a beginner levels.
posted by wongcorgi at 11:08 PM on June 16, 2010

I often used to make the effort to go and see Ziyo (various videos of them in action on Youku; Myspace) - lead singer Helen Feng has a great voice. She's now also singing with Pet Conspiracy apparently, whoo I don't know so well.
posted by Abiezer at 12:16 AM on June 17, 2010

Jay Chou to me has pretty poor enunciation. In his place I would recommend 陳楚生. This is his "Has Anybody Ever Told You". 莫文蔚's "Cloudy Day" isn't the typical ballad, and the lyrics is actually fairly interesting.
posted by of strange foe at 8:26 AM on June 17, 2010

Jay Chou's enunciation is terrible. Anecdotally, I was at the concert he gave in Toronto in the December of 2008, and he himself made a crack advising against using his songs to learn Chinese, seeing as he has a lot of fans abroad.

Love his music, though, so I would definitely recommend him for pure aural pleasure.
posted by Phire at 11:00 AM on June 17, 2010

Really late answer, but I have something to contribute, so:

I recommend 王菲 Wáng Fēi. Some of her stuff is bland pop, but when she's alternative, she's very alternative. Plus, she's from Beijing and has quite a clear Beijing accent, and is a very good singer. She's considered one of the queens of Chinese music, which is kind of weird considering how alternative some of her stuff is, but I guess that stuff mostly gets ignored.

My favorite of her albums was 浮躁 Fúzào ("Impetuous"), which was produced mostly by Robin Guthrie (of Cocteau Twins). There are some wonderful songs on that album, including one song, "扫兴 Sǎoxìng" ("Ruining the Mood"), that I plan to use someday to help teach resultative adverbs in Mandarin. Her album 唱游 Chàngyóu ("Song journey") is also quite alternative in flavor, and there are songs here and there elsewhere that are pretty good.
posted by jiawen at 1:17 PM on January 7, 2011