Jay Jay, 25, grew up in a single-parent household in Taipei, Taiwan. His mother was a middle school teacher and his father divorced his mother when he was young. Because of this, his mother pinned all her hopes on him.
When Jay was 3 years old, his mother saw that he was talented in music, so she didn't hesitate to take out all the family's savings and buy him a piano. Thus, the childhood Jay was deprived of the right to play. But whenever he practiced the piano, he always played absent-mindedly when he heard the playful sounds of his peers outside the window. So his mother took a stick and stood behind him, keeping an eye on him as he finished practicing.
Mother's "stick education" made Jay play the piano well, but it also made him quiet and withdrawn, and he never did well in school.
After Jay was admitted to Tamshui High School in Taipei, he became a "well-known figure" in the school because he could play the piano. But while his classmates were nervously preparing for university entrance exams, he was still indulging in his music hobby. In the eyes of the general public, his future was bleak. In Taiwan, the best option for a child from an ordinary family is to study math, natural sciences and computers in order to find a good job and make a living, while music is a luxury for the rich. Apparently, they don't think Jay can afford that luxury.
In June 1996, after graduating from high school, Jay couldn't find a job, so he applied for a job as a waiter at a restaurant. His daily job is to send the chef's dishes to the restaurant, and then pass them to the guests by the waitress. This job seems simple, but really do it is not easy. Because more guests, it is easy to pass the dishes wrong. And once the mistake, the waiter not only to suffer the customer's anger, but also the boss will have to withhold salary.
Despite all the hassles of the job, Jay's love of music continues unabated. Every time he gets paid, he runs to the music supermarket and spends almost all his money on buying tapes. Normally, he likes to take the tape player with him and listen to music when he has nothing to do.
On one occasion, Jay, who was in a good mood, held a plate of food in both hands and listened to songs while walking. He accidentally bumped into a waitress, spilling a plate of hot food all over the waitress's body. The waitress's hand was blistered by the soup and she cried out in pain. The restaurant manager heard the cries and rushed over immediately. He severely criticized Jay and unceremoniously fined Jay 2,000 Taiwan dollars (equivalent to about 450 yuan).
The unsociable Jay didn't say a word, and his tears went straight to his stomach. You know, his monthly salary at that time is only 4000 yuan Taiwan dollar ah! And now, all of a sudden, the manager deducted half of it, how can he still have money to buy tapes ah!
Shortly after this incident, the owner of the restaurant, in order to improve the taste of the restaurant, equipped with a piano in the restaurant, wanting to take advantage of the guests to play music during dinner. But several pianists were hired and fired because they were not to the owner's taste.
One day after work, the itchy Jay Chou took advantage of his boss's absence to play a song he had just written on the brand-new piano, which surprised the staff: the big boy, who was never a big talker, actually played the piano!
Soon the story reached the boss's ears. The boss immediately called Jay and asked him to act as a pianist to play the music he had composed in the hall. A few days later, he also informed the local TV station that the waiter at his place not only played the piano, but also wrote songs. In this way, the owner took advantage of the TV station's hype to kill two birds with one stone, not only increasing the restaurant's popularity, but also saving a large sum of money on the expenses of hiring a pianist.
From then on, Jay no longer need to be a waiter, but every day sitting at the piano to create their own tunes, but after a long time, some guests asked to order songs. This forced him to play the music to the mood of the guests.
On one occasion, a guest in the restaurant had a birthday and wanted Jay to play a light-hearted piece of music. But at that moment, another owner who had been drinking too much wine flung out a large pile of bills and said he wanted to listen to something more exciting. Seeing this scene, the birthday guest is also not willing to show weakness, from the bag out of a pile of bills, "snap" thrown in front of Jay Chou said: "Who is afraid of who ah, I want to listen to the night under the moonlight!" The two sides argued, no one refused to give in, and almost came to blows. Jay Chou had a bright idea, he said, "You are all guests here, I can't take this money. Now, I'll play a piece of music, you guys guess, and whoever guesses correctly will sing along with my accompaniment." Seeing that this was a good idea, the two men readily agreed.
In this way, the clever Jay first played a light piece of music for the birthday guests to guess, and then played a weird symphony for the drunken guests to guess. After a few songs, both sides were so satisfied that instead of fighting, they sang to each other. In this way, the atmosphere of the restaurant was immediately eased. The boss was so happy that he immediately gave Jay a raise in salary to 7,000 Taiwan dollars a month.
Selling songs to survive, Andy Lau won't sing his songs
In September 1997, Jay's cousin enrolled him in a local TV station's entertainment program ----- "Super Fierce Newcomer King". At the time, the show's host, Wu Tsung-hsien, who also owned Taiwan's Alpha Music, arranged for Jay to perform piano accompaniment and allowed him to bring a singer to sing.
On the day of the show, Jay wore a casual outfit and a duck-tongued hat with the brim pressed down, dressed as a cool look. He didn't want the show to start, but the music he accompanied made it very difficult for his singer to sing. At once, the venue booed ......
Jay Chou acted out. At this point, just happened to be standing next to the judges Wu Zongxian took a look at the song sheet in passing, could not help but be surprised ----- this seemingly careless, even debauchery young man wrote the song, not only the song sheet to be very complex, but also copied neatly. Out of curiosity, after the program was done, he invited Jay to quit his job and come to his music company to write songs.
While Jay didn't understand why he would be so popular with the host even though he was a bad actor, he readily agreed to write songs on a full-time basis.
When he first joined the company, Jay's job was as a music production assistant. He had to do all sorts of chores, including helping his colleagues buy lunch boxes, which was his daily routine. He knows that he is a newcomer, in order to make a living in the music company, we have to help colleagues more "errands", so he is always very diligent.
On one occasion, the company was producing a record for a major Hong Kong singer. Due to the recording studio people, and more scattered, Jay Chou deliberated no way to count a **** how many people want to eat a box lunch. In order not to leave anyone behind, that day he made four or five trips back and forth from 12 o'clock at noon. In the end, he could not even drink his own water, and there was actually no one in the studio to help him.
Wu Zongxian took these in his eyes and thought: this young man is down-to-earth, not afraid of suffering, but he is always so busy, which has time to write songs ...... So he equipped Jay with an office and named it Alpha Music Studio, allowing him to concentrate on songwriting.
From then on, the tiny place became a platform for Jay to let his dreams fly. Even though his salary was only 5,000, he was interested in music like never before. Even outside the recording studio, he can feel the joy of music. Thus, he worked like a fish out of water.
Because of Jay's solid musical background since childhood, he soon produced a large number of songs. But to Wu's incomprehensibility, the lyrics he created were always strange and almost no one in the music circle liked them, thus, he always put Jay's manuscripts aside in disappointment.
Once again, Jay took his masterpiece and sent it to Wu Zongxian for review. This time, Wu Zongxian saw his complacent look and tried to provoke him. When he got the manuscript, he didn't even look at it, so he crumpled the song into a ball and then threw it into the trash can beside him.
Seeing this scene, Jay said nothing and turned to leave his boss's office. He couldn't help the tears from his eyes ......
But the defiant young man knew that giving up would mean firing himself. So he continued to write, the next day, the third ...... He worked at the rate of one song a day. For seven days in a row, when Wu went to work at eight o'clock every morning, he always saw Jay Zhou's work on time. Finally, he was y moved by the young man's talent and diligence and agreed to find singers to perform the songs he composed.
In February 1998, Jay Chou composed another song titled "Tears Know". This time, Wu Zongxian decided to recommend the song to Andy Lau, a heavenly singer at the time, to sing. Unwillingly, when the lyrics were transferred to Andy Lau, he only glanced at them lightly and shook his head repeatedly, saying, "How can tears know, what do tears need to know?" With that, Andy Lau, who did not appreciate these lyrics, immediately refused to sing the song.
After that, Jay wrote another song -- "Double-Cutting Stick" -- for Zhang Huimei, who was on fire in the Chinese-speaking world at the time. He thought that Zhang Huimei was more avant-garde and should be more receptive to the songs he created. However, he didn't expect that his carefully composed "Double-Cut Stick" would be rejected by A-Mei without any hesitation.
After failing again and again, Jay, who has always aspired to make a mark in songwriting, was lost, and he even wondered how far he could go on his musical journey ......
Three, the self-song, wage earners into a red king
Just when Jay's enthusiasm for creativity was dealt a heavy blow, his boss Wu Zongxian gave him great encouragement. Wu, who has been engaged in music production for a long time, saw Jay's unique comprehension of music. So he decided to give the talented youngster another chance - to let him walk on stage and sing the songs he had written himself.
One day in December 1999, Wu Zongxian called Jay to his office and said very solemnly, "Alan, I'll give you 10 days, and if you can write 50 songs and I can pick 10 out of them, then I'll help you make a record."
Jay Chou was so excited to hear that his boss was going to help him make a record that he couldn't speak, so he just gave a "hmmm" and walked out with his head down.
Back at the Alpha Music Studio, Jay was excited, but instead of rushing to write a song, he ran down the street and bought a big box of instant noodles. He thought, "It's just a matter of putting up a last struggle. Because he knew that this might be the only chance the boss gave him. Next, Jay stayed in the music room and started composing. During that time, he composed almost one song after another, and every time he finished writing a song, he was as happy as if he had given birth to a child. And whenever he was tired, he took a nap in a corner of the room and woke up to continue working on the next song.
Jay Chou's mother, seeing that her son was not coming home for a few days, specially rushed to the company to visit him. She was heartbroken to see her son working all night and just eating some instant noodles every day. So, she dragged her son to a restaurant near the company, ordered a full table of food, and only after watching him eat it all, did she feel relieved to leave. After that, Jay dove headfirst into the Alpha Music Room ......
In this way, in just 10 days, Jay literally came up with 50 songs, and each one was beautifully written and neatly composed. Faced with this amazing creative speed, Wu Zongxian was speechless. Then, he selected 10 songs from Jay's compositions and prepared to make a record for release.
After half a year of meticulous production, Jay's first album, Jay Len, was produced. Until then, he was truly relieved. Because the music he had been pursuing for nearly 20 years had finally come to fruition, and it was performed by himself, which was something really unexpected. Even though he didn't know if his record would sell in the market, he was still excited about it - it was his first album, after all, and he'd sweated blood to get it!
Early in 2001, the young man who hadn't spoken more than two words a day had an unexpected breakthrough. His first album was snapped up by fans as soon as it was released. During that year's Taiwan Pop Music Awards, "Jay" won three awards at the Taiwan Pop Music Golden Melody Awards for Best Pop Vocal Album, Best Producer and Best Composer.
In December 2001, Jay's second album, <
In early 2002, Jay won the 2001 "Most Popular Male Vocalist" award at the 8th Global Chinese Music Chart.
As if overnight, the Chinese pop music scene was almost ruled by Jay's voice alone. His pure music style, unruly appearance and his "unfounded" scandal have become the center of attraction for the younger generation of fans. After each of his concerts, even teenage girls would touch the piano chair he had just sat on with a sense of pilgrimage. ...... The young man, who has been on the scene for less than a year, has become a super-heavyweight in Taiwan and even in the entire Chinese singing world.
From a restaurant waiter grew into a household name of the popular little king, Jay said in an interview with the U.S. "Time" magazine, "the dream of the star is not unattainable, in fact, anyone can do, as long as you are willing to work hard. The reason I am where I am today is the result of my not giving in." Yes, a person who doesn't want to be a retreating coward should climb up step by step like a snail. If you keep pursuing it, then what else is there in the world ......