Ming's Music Channel

Shenmue Theme

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 07:47:40 -0400

Ahhh... here comes the classic theme from a classic console-game on dreamcast, Shenmue (also my long-time favorite). It isn't as famous a video game theme as the Final Fantasy series or alike, so I'm doubtful if you guys can recognize that. :D But hey, it is definitely a GREAT one!! You know what I'm always fascinated about? The unique character of eastern musicians! The original composer of this Japanese game is a Chinese-born Japanese. The sensitivity, the depth of emotional touch, and the variety of subtle styles, these are the artistic qualities that someone sharing the cultural background would deeply appreciate. Also, there's a personal association with this theme music for me. I was in my sophomore year when I played that game. This theme music impressed me so much that since then this motif has been with me whenever I go. I found that I can effortlessly recite the whole song! This recording is done on my digital piano using my own style. I'm quite confident that it is quite close to the original track though :) Hope you guys will enjoy it!

보고싶다 - Kim Bum Soo

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 07:30:12 -0400

One of the few Korean song that I obtained accompaniment track!!! So this song became my first attempt at recording Korean songs. OH... And you know that Kim Bum Soo is my favorite Korean singer! SO I recorded this one with absolute respect to him. Well..... I'm not good at speaking Korean so bear in mind the pronunciation. Lot's of my friends gave me extremely positive feedback after I first circulated this song in mid-2008, and their kind feedback does lend me more confidence to try another Korean song in future. I actually found myself enjoyKorean songs a lot… for good or bad...hehe... Hope you guys enjoy this one too~~

错过 - 沙宝亮

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 06:41:05 -0400

This is the last song I recorded in my home studio before I moved out from that suburban apartment in Minghang to work at downtown Shanghai.

I'm glad that I liked this song so much that I actually delivered 100% of what I possess in both singing style and emotional expressions.

The melody is fabulous, so is the lyrics. I have to admit that I was absolutely captivated by this song the first time I heard it. And the song took me 8 hours in recording and such prolonged recording session in turn generated more than 20 gigs of data that I painfully post-edited for days in Samplitude to get the best out of them. So yeah… you can definitely tell there's a lot of effort committed into this piece.

Sha Baoliang is unquestionably a great singer, who I admire and get inspirations for years. His bright tonal quality in high-pitch voice is something I can't compete with. But this song… haha… is in the mid-range. So I definitely enjoyed such great chance to compete with Sha in every aspect of vocal performance. Hope you guys like it as much as I enjoyed it!

This song is my favorite recording so far, and it has since become my signature work. But I still look forward to a future work that can supplant this song. It might actually take a good while for such work to emerge, considering I'm so busy fulfilling other opportunities right now :)

落叶归根 - Leehom

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 06:26:34 -0400

Leehom has done some great songs throughout these years, and this one is actually the best in my opinion. Not only does it contains an attractive melody that's kinda unique and memorable, it also has been perfectly performed by Leehom. I undertook the challenge to record this song with an expectation to deliever my best but knowing I probably won't be as close as the original excellence of Leehom. I actually surprised myself a bit. I like this recording. The falsetto is used smoothly throughout the songs, so it is less forced but more subtle when I try to hit those high notes. I probably will record a complete piece in future (this one is only a half-song). Hope you guys will like it too!

Soulmate - Natasha Bedingfield

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 06:20:12 -0400

Natasha Bedingfield's "Souldmate" is one of my favorite song. I recall first hearing it during the reality show "The Hills" years ago. As soon as I got this accompaniment track, I recorded this song. While the pitch DOES look toooo high for me, I actually finished it.... Not sure if it's a torture for others, but I actually think I did just fine...

Come What May

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 06:14:47 -0400

One of my favorite songs. From the film MOULIN ROUGE. The accompaniment track is superb in quality. Quite rare for a western song.

李玖哲 - 想太多

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 06:12:38 -0400

I didn't find much chinese songs in my hard-disk that survived throughout these years. Most of my Chinese song recordings were done on a whim that, due to poor quality, I deleted shortly after. Lee is a korean singer, so I actually though it was a Korean song.... For whatever reason, this song survived...

Trouble Water

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 06:06:31 -0400

Probably the oldest recording I could find. This song was recorded even before I finished my vocal training. And the recording equipments were poor, so the quality isn't nice. But it was still a milestone. Anything recorded before that song I could barely listen to, while anything after this song looks good in general.

Yanni Impression

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 05:37:45 -0400

I recorded one of Yanni's most famous works in my own improvising style on digital piano. This is probably the only piece of work I can play at anytime off-handed. It's become part of my music knowledge for more than a decade. I hope I can find other Yanni-inspired works that I've recorded. I remember there used to be plenty, but I end up finding only this one...

Winter Hymn

Sat, 06 Nov 2010 05:36:04 -0400

A simple and easy-listening melody that I came up during improvising. I used the midi-keyboard with a digital synthesized sound to record this piece. It was a bit warm but not too hilarious.