Life and Leisure

Nameless now but a face for the future

By Chen Nan (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-12-14 08:06

Cantonese pop singer Denise Ho has finally released her first Mandarin album, titled Wu Ming Shi in Chinese, which means "nameless".

"As the title suggests, I'm a new face here," says Ho, who was in Beijing for her first mini-concert at Mao Livehouse.

During the two-hour concert, hundreds of fans cheered and sang along with her.

Pop singer Denise Ho releases her first Mandarin album Wu Ming Shi. Provided to China Daily

Ho says she spent a long time preparing and thinking about the album, which has the English title HOCC 2010, and initially collaborated with some producers from Taiwan who know the mainland market better.

"I realized the songs might be more easily accepted by fans, but thought I would lose my style. So I (changed my mind and) decided to do the album with my own team who have been working with me since I started," she says.

She did, however, invite long-time friends to write songs for her, such as the front man for Taiwan's popular rock band Mayday, Ashin, and Taiwan pop singer Mavis Fan. The tunes Nonsense Talk and Steel Man are her own.

After spending more than a year recording the album, Ho, 33, has spent two months promoting it in Taiwan and Beijing. She says it feels like starting all over again.

"Ten years have passed. I have more experience and I am more mature. But in Beijing and Taiwan, I don't have to present my past achievements because it means nothing to the fans there. People just care about what this album is about and how the music sounds," she says.

Ho landed her first contract with Capital Artists after winning the New Talent Singing Contest in 1996. She spent several years touring with the late pop diva Anita Mui, as a backing singer, before releasing her debut album, First, in 2001.

Her deep, powerful voice, made her stand out among Hong Kong's female singers at the time. For her second album, Dress Me Up, she produced all the songs herself, and then set up her own music studio and insisted on her own style.

"I have been hesitant about whether I should compromise with the market. In Hong Kong, almost everyday you can see a new face and the market is cruel. But I didn't give up," Ho says.

Mui passed away in 2003 and Ho says her death shocked her and made her grow up fast.

"Suddenly, I lost the greatest support in my life. But what that taught me lingers in my mind," she says.

Ho then spent her time writing music and was the lead actress, producer and director of the musical Butterfly Lovers, in 2005.

She regularly received mainstream Hong Kong music awards and held her first Hong Kong Coliseum concert in 2006, followed by another in 2007, which were great successes.

She has also been active when it comes to social issues, producing the album Ten Days in the Madhouse, and teaming up with filmmaker Mak Yan-yan in 2008 to make the documentary, The Decameron, raising awareness about the plight of people with mental illness.

"When I passed 30 years of age, I felt like taking more responsibility for society and myself," she says.

She also recalls a show she did for a small community of Hong Kong's socially vulnerable groups. There were just 50 people in the audience, but Ho calls it the most impressive performance of her career so far.