Singers Lemon Luan (欒克勇) and Wang Feng-chu (王鳳) and the New Taipei City-based group Dancecology staged Hakka-themed performances on Saturday and Sunday at the Kallang Theatre in Singapore.
The shows were held in honor of the Char Yong Dabu Association, which is celebrating the 160th anniversary of its founding with a Hakka cultural festival featuring traditional food and music.
Luan and Wang are Golden Melody Award winners and are renowned in Singapore’s Hakka community.
Photo: CNA
In an interview with the Central News Agency on Monday, Luan said that he had chosen a wide range of songs, including rock, folk, religious, pop and rap, for the Singapore concert to show the changing nature of the Hakka music scene in Taiwan.
“All of the songs show a rich blending of tradition and modernity in Hakka music,” he said.
Luan’s band, Shock (俠客樂團), performed Youtong Zuoke (油桐作客), which won the grand prize at the Hakka Affairs Council’s Hakka Tung Blossom Festival in 2011; Shuzhuang Dengdai (梳妝等待), which tells of two generations of Hakka women’s changing attitudes toward love; Kuaile Enliang Chai (快樂恩倆儕), Xin Deng (心燈), Hongcheng Youmeng (紅塵有夢) and Kejia Meizi (客家妹子).
Photo: CNA
Dancecology artistic director Peng Hsiao-yin (彭筱茵) said that her group performed Shicha (食茶), which is based on a Hakka community ritual of sharing tea and telling stories under the shade of temple trees.
The troupe’s other pieces use jazz and rock music to emphasize the youthful vitality of the nation’s Hakka culture, with contemporary music by Lo Sirong (羅思容), while Peng Hsuang-lin (彭雙琳) performed using traditional instruments, Peng said.
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