<\/p>\n
<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p> <\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Annual Lecture: Telling Taiwan\u2019s Love Stories Through Old Songs<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\"><em>By Alison Lin Tsai<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The long-waited and highly-expected WTIC Annual Lecture was on, supper\u00a0successfully on 9\/27, 2017.<\/p>\n<p>Entering the auditorium located on the second floor of Institute of Diplomacy and International Affairs, we\u00a0noticed\u00a0many\u00a0more extra chairs were added to the original ones. Soon the auditorium was filled to bursting with so many music-and-old song lovers — WTIC members and guests.\u00a0Amazingly, the annual lecture titled \u201cTelling Taiwan\u2019s Love Stories through Old Songs\u201d attracted so large an audience.<\/p>\n<p>Mme. Lee, WTIC president, introduced the lecturer, Jenny Wang Chen,\u00a0and awarded a present to her and a <em>red envelope<\/em>\u00a0to her daughter as the interpreter to\u00a0the foreign ladies,\u00a0in token of heartfelt thanks from all the members of WTIC.<\/p>\n<p>As a researcher of Taiwanese folk songs and popular music, Mrs. Chen successfully gave the audience exposure to the songs of great vitality from 1910\u2019s to 1980\u2019s. Beginning with the well-known song — <em>Songbie<\/em> (\u9001\u5225), Mrs. Chen demonstrated what a song of great vitality is. <em>Songbie<\/em> originated from \u201c<em>Dreaming of Home and Mother<\/em>\u201d which is written by John Pond Ordway in 1851 and is a sentimental song of American civil war era. It had been popular in Japan since 1904. Hong Yi learned this song when he studied in Japan and wrote Chinese lyrics for it in 1915. This is what we know as <em>Songbie<\/em> today. In 1960, Haiyin Lin presented different lyrics version of <em>Songbie<\/em> in her book. After arranged by Shin-Chuan\u00a0Chou, the new song, <em>Chengnan Songbie<\/em> (\u57ce\u5357\u9001\u5225) was first performed in 2013, and has been one of the favorite choir songs since then. A song like this traveling in different time and space without being forgotten is definitely one of great vitality.<\/p>\n<p>Elements of love songs change over time. Mrs. Chen selected three Taiwanese love songs representing different eras. In 1930s, the key element is Chinese literature. For example, \u201c<em>Hoping for the Spring Wind <\/em>(\u671b\u6625\u98a8)\u201d (1933) is motivated by \u201c<em>The Story of the Western Wing <\/em>(\u897f\u5ec2\u8a18)\u201d which is a famous Chinese dramatic work in Yuan Dynasty. The song describes a young girl\u2019s complicated feeling that she has a desire for love but is shy and embarrassed to speak out. In 1950s, western music is incorporated into Taiwanese love songs. \u201c<em>Green Island Serenade <\/em>(\u7da0\u5cf6\u5c0f\u591c\u66f2)\u201d (1954) is a representative one and is originally accompanied by orchestral strings. In addition to enjoying the beautiful melody, the love story behind this song is a bonus of the lecture. Most people connect this song with the prison at <em>Lyudao<\/em> and think it is a love song composed by a prisoner. The truth is that the green island is referred to Taiwan because it is glossy, green and prosperous. Actually, the song was written by Yingjie Pan for pursuing a romantic relationship with a high school girl. In 1970s, studying abroad in the U.S.A. was very popular. Therefore, the element of studying abroad is added to love songs in that era. Ching-His Weng composed \u201c<em>The Moon Speaks My Love for You <\/em>(\u6708\u4eae\u4ee3\u8868\u6211\u7684\u5fc3)\u201d (1973) when he studied in America. This song has been interpreted by many singers, but the most famous one is Teresa Teng\u2019s version released in 1977.<\/p>\n<p>Galaxy Stars Show (1962-1977) was a big hit all over Taiwan. Mrs. Chen categorized the songs from Galaxy Stars Show to four types \u2013 Hong Kong- and Shanghai-based songs; missing hometown songs; movie theme songs; foreign melody with Chinese lyrics songs. Some examples of each category are summarized in the table below.<\/p>\n<table width=\"624\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"142\"><strong>Type<\/strong><\/td>\n<td width=\"482\"><strong>Example<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"142\">Hong Kong- and Shanghai-based<\/td>\n<td width=\"482\"><em>Love without Ends <\/em>(\u4e0d\u4e86\u60c5),<\/p>\n<p><em>Wait for You <\/em>(\u75f4\u75f4\u5730\u7b49)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"142\">Missing Hometown<\/td>\n<td width=\"482\"><em>My Home is on the Other Side of Mountains <\/em>(\u5bb6\u5728\u5c71\u90a3\u908a),<\/p>\n<p><em>Dance of Youth <\/em>(\u9752\u6625\u821e\u66f2)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"142\">Movie Theme<\/td>\n<td width=\"482\"><em>Moon over the West Attic <\/em>(\u6708\u6eff\u897f\u6a13),<\/p>\n<p><em>Farm Village\u2019s Song <\/em>(\u8fb2\u6751\u66f2)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"142\">Foreign Melody with Chinese Lyrics<\/td>\n<td width=\"482\"><em>Under Banyan Tree <\/em>(\u6995\u6a39\u4e0b)\/ Japan,<\/p>\n<p><em>My Lover\u2019s Yellow Shirt <\/em>(\u60c5\u4eba\u7684\u9ec3\u896f\u886b)\/ Korea,<\/p>\n<p><em>Tender Emotion, Raining Tears <\/em>(\u591a\u5c11\u67d4\u60c5\u591a\u5c11\u6dda)\/ USA,<\/p>\n<p><em>My Heart Holds Only You, not Him <\/em>(\u6211\u7684\u5fc3\u88e1\u53ea\u6709\u4f60\u6c92\u6709\u4ed6)\/ France,<\/p>\n<p><em>O Sole Mio <\/em>(\u6211\u7684\u592a\u967d)\/ Italy.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p> <\/p>\n<p>The lecture ended after briefly introducing representative songs from Campus Folk Rock era, because we were running out of time. One of the lecture highlights is that some of the songs were performed on site with accessories corresponding to the song\u2019s situation. Taking \u201c<em>Bamboo Wrapped Rice Dumplings<\/em> (\u71d2\u8089\u7cbd)\u201d as an example, the selling sound from some audience wearing Taiwanese hats and having towels round necks was very impressive. The scene was so vivid that the audience began clapping and cheering. With slides, CDs, DVDs, film,\u00a0and live singings in different dialects and languages from different corners, Mrs. Chen led all the attendees into her lecture, so creatively organized. It was an absolutely knowledgeable and joyful lecture.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":2013,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[30],"tags":[],"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2012"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2012"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2012\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2107,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2012\/revisions\/2107"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtic.org.tw\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}