The chinese bob dylan

[tokyo_girl]

the other day i was reading in the herald tribune about china's bob dylan.... i threw out the article so forget the name - maybe yang yi....

is this an accurate description or an overblown superlative? anyone familiar with the music? is it worth rushing out to buy?

[roddy]

I found this article (originally in german) about Cui Jian, which describes him as a Chinese Bob Dylan (and also a Chinese John Lennon)

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://www.chinapur.de/Cui_Jian/hauptteil_cui_jian.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dchinas%2Bbob%2Bdylan%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8

Roddy

[tokyo_girl]

That's a great effort Roddy.

Domo arigato or should that be xiexie.

The name doesn't sound familiar - maybe i have a non retentive

memory or maybe a comparison with Bob Dylan is cheap

currency.

[roddy]

http://www.iht.com/ihtsearch.php?id=100629&owner=(IHT)&date=20030626134149

I think you should find this effort satisfactory. Unfortunately I have never heard any of his music.

Roddy

[tokyo_girl]

Yes yes yes

Superb research Roddy!

Then comparison with Dylan might be cheap currency.

He sounds like an intriguing character.

If anyone comes across his music I'd be really interested to know

what it's like.

[Tsunku]

There's a Chinese group called Hangtian that sounds exactly like Bob Dylan. He even has a song that's called "A Tribute to the Curly Haired Singer Bob Dylan." I picked it up quite randomly in Kunming not knowing what to expect, but seriously, its as if Bob himself learned how to speak Chinese. Really kinda funny to listen too.

[Guest Fio]

his chinese name "cui1jian4"~~

[Guest Damai]

Sorry, I'm a newbie here, this is my first post. But, I had to post something because the musician to which tokyo_girl refers is, in fact, named Yang Yi. Yang Yi is a street musician who performs in front of the National Art Museum in Beijing. He is originally from Guangdong, and has performed in Europe and Hong Kong. He uses a guitar and harmonica, and travels the country collecting folk melodies and stories which he incorporates into his own songs. He sounds like a mixture between Tom Waits and Dylan but with some very Chinese melodies from Shaanxi and Gansu. Cui Jian has been compared to Mr. Dylan, but Yang Yi is the one who is currently referred to as the 'Dylan of China' because his style and ethic is very similar to Dylan's. Yang Yi is not so well known in Beijing, but he's very well recieved in Hong Kong, and he performs there regularly. He has one CD out which is almost impossible to find unless you meet him. But it's a great CD with great cover art. So, yes. YANG YI. Remember that name.

Cui Jian, on the other hand, is considered the godfather of rock 'n' roll in China. He was the first rock singer in mainland China and every single rock singer idolizes him. He is huge, so it shouldn't be hard to find his music even in the U.S. He's mentioned in the Lonely Planet for Beijing.

I hope this clears things up.

[roddy]

Hi Damai, welcome to the forums.

Thanks for the extra information. If you have a look at the link I post above you'll find a newspaper article about Yang Yi

Hope you enjoy the forums . . .

Roddy

[Guest Damai]

Sorry. I'm just a big Yang Yi fan. I'm friends with him and stuff, so I have no idea how well known he is.

[roddy]

Nothing to be sorry about - keep posting . . . (and if you want to invite Yang Yi to join to, feel free . . )

Roddy

[niubi]

here are some articles about yang yi:

http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/issues/2001/8/Profile_YangYi

http://www.iht.com/articles/100629.html

http://fpeng.peopledaily.com.cn/200105/01/eng20010501_69047.html.

unfortunately now that the folk rock group wild children are no longer in the business of running a bar (namely the river bar) in beijing there are fewer places to hear original folk rock.

[niubi]

by the way, i just found that the website of wild children and their former bar, river, has some music samples of yang yi's music:

http://www.wildchildren.net/rivermusic/heyinyue/yangyi/yangyi.htm

[Guest Matt]

Cool a Chinese Bob Dylan I can't believe I never found any of that when I was looking for music in Harbin gutted

Oh yeah Hi this is my first post and I know Roddy from his Harbin days

Are the any other Chinese versions of people...I mean walking round I did see a couple of people who looked like Chinese versions of Elvis...but I was wondering if there's like an actual Chinese Elvis...now that would be cool.

[akdn]

Here is a good write-up of Cui Jian:

http://www.steinberg.net/en/community/artist_news/stories/cui_jian/index.php?sid=8b995fc6524b4a7c6ee4de4cd04cce2b

It mentions his performance in Tiananmen Square in May 1989. I believe he wore a red blindfold for this. It's a classic image.

Once I was invited to play bass for a band who wanted to perform a few Cui Jian songs at a school concert in Harbin. Quite disastrous - the lead singer / guitarist (our Cui Jian) wore the red blindfold, and totally messed up the beginning of the song. We had to stop, so that he could remove the blindfold and start again...

[bokane]

What are the characters for Yang Yi's name? His stuff might be on mp3.baidu.com...

[roddy]

杨一

According to the last link posted by niubi above - which also has a brief bio in English and Chinese and some downloadable stuff

Roddy

[laolee]

Here are a couple more links to Cui Jian

http://members.aol.com/Jakajk/cuicobra.html

http://www.dennisrea.com/cuijian.html

I recently watched his 1992 concert on video just this weekend. It's quite good. It includes six mtv of his songs too. Cui Jian was the featured musician in the the film BEIJING BASTARDS by Zhuang Yuan.

Does anyone know what he is up to currently?

Once I was invited to play bass for a band who wanted to perform a few Cui Jian songs at a school concert in Harbin. Quite disastrous - the lead singer / guitarist (our Cui Jian) wore the red blindfold, and totally messed up the beginning of the song. We had to stop, so that he could remove the blindfold and start again...

Oooh, must have been embarassing. I watched this on the video and since Cui Jian plays the trumpet on this song too, I thought to myself, don't mess up, since he has to place the trumpet on the stand attached on the microphone stand.

[Ru Yi]

Does anybody out there know where Yang Yi is now and what he is doing? I would appreciate it if anyone could post something about his current status to the forum.

[geek_frappa]

Nothing to be sorry about - keep posting . . . (and if you want to invite Yang Yi to join to' date=' feel free . . )

Roddy[/quote']

good point.

i'm sure some pop stars would be happy to join the forum.

let's see what we can do.