East or West无问西东

Background: Some words about my favorite singer after reviewing a western pop song tutor’s comments about his singing talent. 看完一位西方流行乐教练关于周深一些演唱评价后的观后感，讨论一下追星与流行歌曲.

Just like the greedy spider starving from hunger, I’m starving from straightening up all of the stuffs in my head. Currently, they’re like monstruous threads, tangling, dangling, yelling, dashing, whining… exploding in my head. Only Rubinstein’s playing of Chopin’s music is coming for the rescue…I don’t know which piece of music it is, but the player’s accurate timing is so sturdy that it seems the only thing that can bring my mind back to the ground. Other than that, the breath of the music, the color changing and subtle flavors of the music bring me into a kind of Alice Wondering experience to fight or co-exist with my exploding mind…早起满脑子各式名样的想法，像一只因饥饿而疯狂觅食的蜘蛛，自己也因急于把脑子里的东西搞个横平竖直而，凌晨码字...

First of all, treasure, treasure! Exactly, when you say something is treasure, it means you can withdraw huge amount of good stuff from it. The first treasure I’m talking about is Charlie Zhou. He is definitely a real treasure as long as you soak yourself in his vast amount songs. Just as the commentator says, while you are listening to him, you can’t help yourself asking the same question, “What’s his background? Did he study classical music? His vowels and shapes and ability is profound but it is relatable and he always mingles it in with current things.” For her, a new fan of Charlie zhou, no matter what’s her expertise, an experienced western pop song tutor, or, an international issue commentator like Qiuyi, or, a professional writer, like Zhou xiaofeng, or, a well known self media producer like Luo zhenyu．．．， all of them , along with me, an unkown noname ordinary, we all can’t help being drawn towards his enchanting charm. And we begin to wonder, who is he? Where did he come from?... Charlie zhou is not that kind of singer like Vitas, who intentionally avoided exposure from mess media and impressed audience with a kind of “real” curtain like mystery. Charlie zhou has been “complained” of “too much exposure to mess media”, yes, lots of “good hearted” “professionals” have been talking about it again and again… Back to the track, I quiet agree with the commentator, it seems Charlie zhou has an excellent and profound classical background when you are listening to him. He sings every note every word so delicately as if he is an excellent piano player. You can recall the piano playing terms from the experience of supervising your kids playing piano, such as, Crescendo & Decrescendo, Staccato, Legato……. While he is singing a more peaceful song, you can find the similarities between him and Chopin, crystal clear, fragile, delicate, exquisite, dreamy… more and more similar vocabulary you can drag on and on. When he is singing a faster piece or more playful tune, it seems you’re listening to Mozart, such a delightful, light hearted kind of fun to enjoy. (Forgive my shallow knowledge about classical music…)

宝藏，第一次真正了解了所谓一个人可以被称为宝藏的含义。而在内行人帮你把你感觉得到却说不出所以然的宝贝拎出来给你看时，你也开始思考，为什么他可以做到“发光”？没有相关家人从事相关行业，没有高知父母从小卷养，没有耀眼国内艺考成绩，出道时没有这个快速消费时代金主爸爸们显而易见的利用价值，除了“猎奇”。当西方人惊叹他的古典音乐背景时，中国人惊叹他的中国之美时，难道这一切都是大家可以凭现实法则可以推断出来的结果吗？古典知识浅薄的自己，一名普普通通的听歌者，会把他的歌声中的清澈，优雅，精美， 破碎感与肖邦联系起来，把他的俏皮充满生机双乐与莫扎特相对比。还有德彪西....从未被“中国风”歌曲买单的自己会把他歌曲中的中国美意境与最美的唐诗宋词中国画中国先贤圣人相对照...一位流行歌手能传递出的这些感受除了他天生的歌唱天赋，他又是在什么样的文化氛围中被滋养的呢？也许就像一位朋友说的，有些人不在读了多少书，而在于天生的敏锐通透，可是他是如何在外界给他的狭窄空间中把这种能力训练到这样锐利的呢？

“The best kind of sings are able to use the most raw sounds the voice can make and make them like music, because of their artistry, their humanity, their technique.” I can’t agree with her any more. I have discussed this with my daughter (a ballet dancing student), she said she found that her ballet idol Alina and Charlie Zhou shares one thing in common, that is, both of them have great sympathetic power over their audience. This demands very high technique skills but both of them can very well tuck the techniques in and express their utmost sincere emotion as if the performance is born within them naturally. For me, a kind of ordinary listener without any related techniques, I can only rely on my first hand listening experience. “Artistry is the creative skill of an artist, writer, actor, or musician.” For ordinary listeners, "artistry" is not an immediate word popping in our mind while we’re listening to a pop song. We view songs as a kind of commodity for us to consume our energy’s “leftover” or commodity like healthy products. As long as it meets our requirement faster, fewer people appreciate it’s artistry value while scrolling up and down the short video clips on Tikotok. “Unfortunately”, Charlie Zhou is this kind of young singer who takes every note incredibly serious and perfect every breath of his singing as an art. A westerner wows at his profound bel canto skills, a Chinese like me, marvels at the classical traditional Chinese aesthetics in his singing, as if I’m appreciating a water painting master piece. He inspires me to value every beautiful thing in my daily life, in my culture. This is also relatable to the word of “humanity”. There are far more his songs to feel his sympathetic, compassionate, generous disposition. He is good at interpreting different subtle human emotions. When he is singing of happiness, you feel happiness. When he is singing for courage, you feel you are capable to pick up strength and start to chase the sun right away. When he is singing melancholic, you feel you’re in the deepest sorrow, but the incredible things is, Charlie Zhou, this sun like radiant magician, will always lift you up from the grief, his song gently pats you and tells you, there is always a light there, at the end of the tunnel. It seems he has the magic to turn sorrow into wisdom…When we lost our words, we simply describe him as the angle sent by God to save us, the inborn singer, who is revealing us an era of elf kind of culture from J.R.R. Tolkien’s story.

当需要时间沉淀才能收获的活动越来越被忽视时，一位歌者还在认真打磨每一句歌词，每一个尾音的处理方法，哪里可以加一个什么，哪里应该用什么样的方式来更好演绎。当流量明星们可以假唱或翻车也能不缺金主爸爸支持，粉丝买账的时代，一些歌手还能一次次live真唱引来无数路人围观…所以我们才有幸享受《大鱼》各个版本那飞入天际浩渺回味无穷的美，有了《幽灵公主》《此生唯你》《花开忘忧》等等等直击心中遗憾又让你觉得人生会圆满的《光亮》，有了他唱的甜就是甜，他唱的心安就是心安，有了让人相信茫茫人海中总会有一座《化身孤岛的鲸》或《避难所》让你心中的《花火》可以靠岸，停泊......于是你不得不热切地期待托尔金《精灵宝钻》中歌者精灵文明的到来，他们歌唱人间疾苦，却把疾苦升华为智慧,希望.......那也许就是歌者文明的时代吧！

Friends always laugh at me when they see I’m in such kind of crazy admiration of a single singer. It’s very much like we view a friend of us who is trying to tell us a magic health product, as you know, that is quiet normal when you’re in your middle age time. It’s not simple for us to persuade each other and come to the common ground. Leave it there and let it be. I’d like to put all of these into one word, “belief”__ No matter what, as long as you believe in it and it does uplift your life, then follow it and let’s meet at the end of the tunnel, happily.

到一这个年纪，朋友们各有各的方式来保存生命中已不多的热情，一款帮你延年益寿的保健品也好，一种理性关爱生命的理念也好，一样爱好也好，也许"相信"所带来的力量都是可取的吧。

Cheers!干杯！