Bulletin Spring‧Summer 2001

Equal Emphasis to Theory and Performance The Department of Music gives equal weight to performance and theory. The founding of the Chung Chi choir provides students with an extra opportunity to be trained in art administration. The choir performs thrice a year, with the students themselves being responsible for the promotion and organization of each performance. One among the three performances has to be of their own compositions. Prof. Yu Siu-wah E v o l v e m e n t o f H o n g K o n g M u s i c Prof. Yu Siu-wah has been studying Chinese music, instrumental music, as well as pop music in Hong Kong, using an ethnomusicological approach, with an aim to discover their relationships with Hong Kong history, politics, and culture. According to Prof. Yu, the development of Chinese instrumental music was most lively from the 40s to the 60s. During that period, large f i l m production companies such as the Shaw Brothers Studio, Fenghuang Film Company, and Great Wall Movie Enterpris e invested a lot o f capital into their productions. When shooting huang mei diao (黃梅調） films, not onl y were the scores especially composed by professionals for the purpose, but live recordings were also made of an entire Chinese orchestra of some 20 musicians. This provided a lot of space for the survival of Chinese instrumental music. It was also common practice for nightclubs at the time to hire Chinese orchestras to perform between their shows. The subsequent appearance of the synthesizer has howeve r meant that the sounds of different kinds of instruments can be simulated easily. That and the demise of night club culture have meant a decline in the popularity o f Chinese instrumental music. Although the majority of Hong Kong people are Cantonese and Cantonese- speakers, the earliest pop music was Western or Mandarin. Cantonese pop music was regarded by the younger generation as vulgar, listened to only by the working classes. Prof. Yu Siu-wah explains that the low production costs for Canto-pop, the lack of originality in its tunes, and the use of the Cantonese opera singing tone were the reasons why Canto-pop failed to attract young people at the time, who were very much into Western pop culture. Things began to change in the 70s when university educated singer Sam Hui wrote catchy tunes, which he sang Western-style, and packaged in a modern fashion. This plus the successful promotion of the new genre on television opened a new chapter for Canto-pop. At the same time, a group of composers and musicians such as Josep h Koo had returned to the territory after completing their studies abroad, who rendered Canto-pop more modern and tasteful. From then on, Canto-pop has been increasing in popularity. It is now a mainstream genre of pop music in Hong Kong. Hong Kong Culture: A Multiplicity of Colours 19