November 11th in China is known as the "Singles' Day", made to celebrate those single individuals that are proud to be classed in said social status.
With that in mind, here's a single from China in our spotlight... with 'single' stated as referring to a commercially-released song, of course!
Tong Hua (童話) Michael Wong| Version |  |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All | x2 (58) | x4 (106) | x4 (165) | x6 (244) |
Taiko 11 Asia, 12 Asia
66.49-68
none
???Clearer audio video (on Sanbai)
China's influence in overall Taiko gaming is a lot slimmer than many would think, with most of the songs that come from the 2+ billion-populated nation being actually made by mixed-nationality performers. That is also the case for the artist of today's featured song!
Tong Hua (lit. 'Fairy Tale') is composed and performed by the Malaysian-Chinese singer/songwriter Michael Wong Kong Leong (王光良), performing since 1995 as Michael Wong. Born in Malaysia on August 30th, 1975, he began his musical career in a singing duo with Victor Wong Pin Kuan until the year 2000, where the joint was disbanded after a mutual agreement. Micheal Wong's solo career is distinguished by the many love songs and ballads that he released for his albums, up to be later known in the Oriental musical scene as "the Prince of love ballads".
The peak of his popularity has culminated with the release of this third studio album on January 21st, 2005, titled Tong Hua due to the aforementioned song being its opening piece. Being more used to compose songs rather than write lyrics for them, Michael Wong asked about 30 different artists for suggestions on Tong Hua's lyrics and, after adding a few personal touches, he let Japanese producer Taichi Nakamura to arrange and produce his final product. Tong Hua's critical and public acclaim could be really compared to a fairy tale's happy ending, as a number of accolades earned by the love song made it Michael Wong's strongest and most popular single to date.
Shortly after its debut, it made into the top spot of the Baidu 500 downloading service, where it stayed on top for the longest amount of consecutive time ever registered thus far with 15 weeks in a row. Tong Hua (the song AND the album) also warranted its creator to be awarded multiple prizes at 2005's Hong Kong TVB8 Golden Music Awards, including the Best Composition, Best Composer/Artist, Top Ten Songs of the Year, and Best of the Year's Top 10 Songs categories. It's also been on top of the most-played choices in many karaoke services across the nation for multiple years in a row, no less!
Featuring multiple minor BPM shifts along the way (one for each stanza's beginning), this love ballad in Taiko is charted like many others before (and after) its General Asia-exclusive arcade ventures, with its Oni mode featuring 3 and 5-note slow clusters in different combinations, with some drumrolls spliced in.
