I heard a terrific (even spine tingling) song in a Canadian-made documentary about the rise of capitalism in China. The doco was called something like China Red. The song was presented at the end of the show, and was derisively described as being reduced to a showpiece in a Hong Kong nightclub act.

The same song turned up in one the middle of one of my favourite soft porns, Unforgetful Holiday. It is sung on karaoke by the main characters, mainly a mainlander.

Then it also turned up in a long documentary about the people who organized and participated in Tianemin Square, a few years after the event.

Anyone have any idea what this song is?
It is clearly a very well-known song.

Haven't seen any of these films, but it could be "March of the Volunteers" which is the current, rather militaristic Chinese national anthem (and which routinely parodied in HK films, especially its refrain "Chi lai! Chi lai! Chi lai!" (stand up!) --- this is what the 'Sperms' are singing in MR VIAGRA.

Or possibly it could be the pre-1980s national anthem, "The East is Red" (dong fang hong) which is much more pentatonic and chinese-y in sound. ("March of the Volunteers" was written by Ni Erh, a Shanghai film studio composer who was elevated to the status of a 'Chinese Beethoven' during the Cultural Revolution...)

If you can find a CD or VCD of the old film of the 1964 political stage spectacular, THE EAST IS RED, almost all the official Chinese patriotic songs can be found there.

Then it also turned up in a long documentary about the people who organized and participated in Tianemin Square, a few years after the event.

This wouldn't happen to be Michael Apted's MOVING THE MOUNTAIN, would it? I'm afraid I don't know the song, but I'm curious about the documentary you're referring to. Having seen Apted's excellent film back in the early 90's, I've always wondered it there was anything else out there on the subject.

Brian Thibodeau wrote:

Then it also turned up in a long documentary about the people who organized and participated in Tianemin Square, a few years after the event.

This wouldn't happen to be Michael Apted's MOVING THE MOUNTAIN, would it? I'm afraid I don't know the song, but I'm curious about the documentary you're referring to. Having seen Apted's excellent film back in the early 90's, I've always wondered it there was anything else out there on the subject.

Not sure. It's running time was nearly four hours, and the main person interviewed was Lu Li [?], a very smooth and confident young man, who seemed ready to assume a leadership role in the government, and had survived an earthquake as a child, which killed 1/2 the people in his home city.

hth

odresel wrote:Haven't seen any of these films, but it could be "March of the Volunteers" which is the current, rather militaristic Chinese national anthem (and which routinely parodied in HK films, especially its refrain "Chi lai! Chi lai! Chi lai!" (stand up!) --- this is what the 'Sperms' are singing in MR VIAGRA.

It doesn't sound like that one, at a guess. The chorus contains a distinctive and lengthened "Ooooahhh" sound in the middle.

odresel wrote:Or possibly it could be the pre-1980s national anthem, "The East is Red" (dong fang hong) which is much more pentatonic and chinese-y in sound. ("March of the Volunteers" was written by Ni Erh, a Shanghai film studio composer who was elevated to the status of a 'Chinese Beethoven' during the Cultural Revolution...)

Was that tune featured also in Tsui Hark's East Is Red ? If so, that's not the one either.

How about moving this one over to HK Soundtracks thread too ?

The documentary is called Red Capitalism :

http://voyager.uvm.edu/bibs/bid675492.html

There are a number of websites mentioning this award-winning documentary. Any help in IDing the song ? I'm still looking.

å

Nope. It isn't any of these.
These are mainly happy, rousing or choral songs.
The only I'm looking for has a much more tearful, even sorrowful quality, and has, as far as I know, only a solo singer.

But the theme of Music of the Chinese Revolution is on the right (or is that the left ?) track ..........


[quote="dleedlee"]å

Time to take a different tack.

I found some software to annotate sheet music, and I wrote the approximate tune. Fortunately, the software also renders the notes into a music track.

Here is the sheet music I wrote from memory :
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~sharptongue/RevSong.jpg

I uploaded the MIDI files to my site as well, but they are not showing as loaded. Do I need to zip them ? I can email them to anyone who might like to guess.

Anyone know a forum I could post this message where a group of obsessives, at least as talented as us, would be able to pick it ?

Bet someone here can find your answer:
http://www.chinese-forums.com/forumdisplay.php?f=13

dleedlee wrote:Bet someone here can find your answer:
http://www.chinese-forums.com/forumdisplay.php?f=13

You won that bet. At last, after slogging away at this one for 14 YEARS .... the answer.

http://7.sn116114.cn/images/2007-10/...3859351052.mp3

血染的风采

Turned out the Cultural Revolution angle was a red(?!) herring. The song is a tribute to soldiers who died fighting the Vietnamese in the 1979 border dispute, and was first recorded in 1987.

A quick flick through the wikipedia page cites 1989, so perhaps it was taken up by the Tiananmin protest movement ?

Anyway, my next task is to find the version of the song actually played on Red Capitalism. The vocalist sounds very similar. There's a strong likelihood that it was a different recording of the same singer. Anyone know who it is ? Sounds a bit high for Anita Mui.

And anyone know where I could find the lyrics ? I'll be doing my own searches, but many hands win the war, or something like that. And Trad Chinese much preferred. I'm still nowhere near any good with Simplified.

A search at yesasia shows that Anita Mui and Jenny Tseng (among many others have sang it). Figuring out _your_ version might be difficult without going back to the film itself.

Anita Mui - disc 2, song 19

Anita Mui compilation, disc 1, song 6


Jenny Tseng - disc 1, song 6

All yesasia hits

I guess the title 血染的風采 could be translated as Blood Stained Wind Gathers?

Anita Mui, in concert, commemorating 6.4.89 students
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQW-0jpbVk4
Over Tiananmen footage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pO4VCyXguSU

Wang Hong is another possibility
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdT57wL9Y6I

STSH wrote:And anyone know where I could find the lyrics ?

也許我告別將ä¸

Marvellous :

And, just to push my luck, in Cantonese as well ?

I could translate it phonetically line by line on that site you referred me to, but it takes ages ........

Fan wrote:

STSH wrote:And anyone know where I could find the lyrics ?

也許我告別將ä¸

STSH wrote:Marvellous :

And, just to push my luck, in Cantonese as well ?

I could translate it phonetically line by line on that site you referred me to, but it takes ages ........

That's in Mandarin. So if 血染的風采 is what you're looking for, you can actually sing along with the pinyin.

Have we found the version you're looking for yet? I'd hate to be left hanging after all this time!

dleedlee wrote:Have we found the version you're looking for yet? I'd hate to be left hanging after all this time!

Not yet. So you're still hanging ..........