For example Yumiko Cheng owed her company thousands of dollars. Many artists however begin with financial hardships. For example, according to some reports, Sammi Cheng earned HK$46M (around US$6M) from advertisement and merchandise endorsements in one month alone. Outside of the music sales, their success can also be gauged by their income from various sources. They immediately expand to the Mandarin market once their fame is established, hence pure Cantopop stars are almost nonexistent.
PAULA TSUI SONGS LIST MOVIE
Publicity is vital to an idol's career, as one piece of news could make or break one's future.Īlmost all modern Cantopop stars go into the movie business regardless of their ability to act. Most of the time, the image sells the albums, as it is one of the characteristic of mainstream music similarly mirrored in the US and Japan. Usually talent is secondary to the success of a Cantopop singer in Hong Kong.
Record companies have had a majority stake in the segment, and Hong Kong is considered the central hub of Cantopop in the world.įrom the inception of Cantopop to the late '80s, Hong Kong had seen many original talents develop into super stars, each with a unique singing style and an easily recognisable voice. Today, Cantopop is the dominant form of music with strong associations to pop culture.
PAULA TSUI SONGS LIST TV
While TV theme songs are still an important part of Hong Kong music, the arrival of the Four Heavenly Kings (四大天王) took Cantopop a stage higher. The genre was launched to unprecedented levels with virtually every TV drama using localised cantopop songs. This song was the creation of the legendary songwriter Joseph Koo (顧嘉輝) and the songwriter Yip Siu-dak (葉紹德). The youth began to gravitate towards Cantonese pop in the 70s.Īround 1971, Sandra Lang (仙度拉) was invited to sing the first Cantonese TV theme song, "The Yuanfen of a Wedding that Cries and Laughs" (啼笑姻緣). The godfather of Cantopop Roman Tam (羅文) made significant strides in the industry. Prominent singers included Tang Kee-chan (鄧寄塵), Cheng Kuan-min (鄭君綿). Prior to the development of popular music in the 1960s, Hong Kong's musical output was dominated by Cantonese opera and English pop. Hong Kong remains the most significant hub of the genre.
Boasting a multinational fanbase especially in Southeast Asian countries such as Malaysia and Singapore, and in Guangdong province of mainland China. Cantopop songs are almost invariably performed in Cantonese. Cantopop draws its influence not only from other forms of Chinese music, but from a variety of international styles, including jazz, rock and roll, rhythm and blues, electronic music, western pop music and others. It is categorized as a subgenre of Chinese popular music within C-pop. It is sometimes referred to as HK-pop, short for "Hong Kong popular music". Cantopop (Chinese: 粵語流行音樂) is a colloquialism for "Cantonese popular music".