At the closing ceremony of "The Voice of Heavenly Gifts", Zhang Hexuan and Li Ziting, as the "flying partners", brought the chorus song "Big Artist", and at that time, after watching their performance at zero distance at the recording site, I and several other judges, as the judges of the "Sound Appreciation Group", could not help but sigh:
"It's a good adaptation!"
For this chinese music pop dance song collection, I really had a hard time imagining how Zhang Hexuan would interpret it, and whether Li Ziting could control it, and as a result, the "Big Artist" partnered by "Beauty and the Beast" collided with a rather fierce spark: Zhang Hexuan's smoke and high voice, Li Ziting's mellowness and penetration, on the basis of not overly changing the structure of the original song, through subversive and innovative arrangements, completed a real re-creation - gorgeous electronic sound effects and violent electric guitar intertwined, With a gothic dark decadent temperament, the competition and determination in the emotional relationship between men and women are performed layer by layer, moving and thrilling, maximizing the vocal characteristics of Zhang Hexuan and Li Ziting, the ethereal chanting of interlude female voices, the high-pitched roar and low rap of male voices, and the ethereal and dramatic musical stage drama color.
When Zhang Hexuan thanked the song's arranger Kang Zhuqing on the stage, I couldn't help but feel surprised:
It turned out to be the work of Kang Zhuqing, no wonder it gave Zhang Hexuan, who "can sing", a distinct color.
Being able to sing is a distinctive label on Zhang Hexuan's body
——In 2012, the first season of "The Voice of China" "You Drunk Me", let this very explosive "violent male voice" have a name in the Chinese music scene, from the launch of the personal single "Daddy" in 2013, until recently for the TV series "Black and White Forbidden Zone" to sing the theme song "Contest", Zhang Hexuan diligently and earnestly cultivated the musical soil, there is not so much fancy noise, we hear and see his works one after another, each time on the stage fully presented.
Almost ten years have passed, from boys to men, as a singer Zhang Hexuan, has become a "reassuring" existence for many people who love to listen to songs, but I will inevitably feel some pity for him - from personality to development, Zhang Hexuan is too low-key, personal style is also because of the team and the environment and once wavered, in addition to everyone's impressive voice and singing skills, many of his songs actually did not play a special role, until I heard his third personal album "Coloring Book" launched after six years, I found: Zhang Hexuan, gradually " it's different".
A different change, from Zhang Hexuan's musical partner, female musician Kang Zhuqing.
As a well-recognized young composer and music producer in China, Kang Zhuqing gave me the impression of "diversity"
——Graduated from the Conservatory of Music of minzu University of China, she has worked as a composer, arranger and music producer for many major projects such as the East Asian Games, the World Youth Athletics Championships, the National Games, the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival, the CCTV Spring Festival Gala, etc., and has also participated in a series of dance dramas and musical theater works, and at the same time cooperated with Zhang Jie, Wang Yibo, Deng Lun, Zhou Bichang, Wu Jing, Yang Mi, Zhang Tianai and many different types of artists, with rich creative experience, so that Kang Zhuqing showed profound professional ability on the one hand. On the other hand, I also saw her "curiosity" about music: just like a little girl who tirelessly plays various roles, shuttles through many styles, breaks the shackles of rules and regulations, the so-called forms or labels are only established for the "moving" of the work itself.
Kang Zhuqing, a rich and inclusive creative producer, met Zhang Hexuan, a singer with deep potential, and ran into more possibilities
——The album "Coloring Book" is a thick and thin attempt made by the two, Kang Zhuqing arranged all 6 works of composition, arrangement and production, as an interpreter, Zhang Hexuan finally had the opportunity to show the precipitation and progress in music over the years with a relatively complete length.
Although, in my opinion, this progress is not thorough enough, and the integration of themes and styles is not deep enough, the album "Coloring Book" can make us think: what kind of relationship should be used between singers and producers to cooperate to produce "effective" musical works?
Hearing the two love songs "Love" and "Tears Will Hurt" at the beginning of the album, I think it will surprise many people, and then the amazing Zhang Hexuan - "We have all loved with our hearts, but unfortunately in love, there are not many good scenery, if you torture each other, it is better to count" of "Love", "Tears will flow and hurt, after love, after the wound scab does not mean silence, how long will it take to let go", the two songs are like the upper and lower chapters of the story, Zhang Hexuan under the production of Kang Zhuqing, converged on too strong "showmanship", with restraint, Clean, penetrating way of interpretation, expressing repressed heartache and helplessness, just listening to the main song is even difficult to make people and the previous "violent" Zhang Hexuan associated, such "retreat to advance" is more advanced, until the end of the second half, the chorus in the pop soft rock style came to an outbreak, with the story level to set off more natural sense of situation.
In the arrangement and production of "Cheap Love Novel", Kang Zhuqing will be good at the musical theater style, with breakthrough heavy metal rock colors, to create a world that integrates classical, popular and electronic, the "light" of the prelude octopus, the "heavy" of the electric guitar roar, the "cleverness" of the female vocal flower cavity aria, and the "change" of the chorus chorus... Zhang Hexuan, the only male protagonist in the one-act drama, "exchanges freedom for mediocrity, surrenders to you, a charming bone", the song tells the conflict, entanglement and madness of love, as if to let the listener watch the plot full of tragic beauty at the same time, Zhang Hexuan's high voice is still ear-catching, but there is no longer an aggressive sense of oppression, more of a "four or two strokes" of ingenuity.
"Half-Life Silence" is a work I like very much, the band's rock style is integrated into the classical drama color, the producer Kang Zhuqing's design in the chorus part is quite interesting, on the one hand, Zhang Hexuan's increasingly strong shouts, "The years strip away the silence of half a life, which color can be left", on the other hand, the low voice that has been distorted and deformed sound effects processing is "What is left", "Echo in the middle of the night"... This contrast highlights the experience of musical theater production, the dramatic treatment continues until the end of the song, the unscrupulous outbreak "late at night repeatedly remind yourself that you have passed, only you still feel that it is me, that is me", behind the high note repeats the quiet confession of "that is me", the whole song is like tearing and questioning the self, no solution, reconciliation - why not everyone in the middle of the night, staged inner fluctuations?
After the two tracks let a classical, folk, ethnic, national style intertwined Zhang Hexuan surfaced, "Duckweed" narrated that "life is a journey, unexpected encounters, in the scenery along the way to pursue", flute, and guitar, piano outline the picture of the journey of life, Zhang Hexuan in the bite word and the use of breath to reflect more details of the fine grasp, almost white painting singing processing, the technique hidden under the emotion, bring more aftertaste; "My South" according to Zhu Ziqing's prose adaptation, Zhang Hexuan opened his mouth "My South, My South" renders the nostalgia that cannot be understood, and the arrangement of Kang Zhuqing, in the opening chapter, Zhang Hexuan's thick voice is strengthened with minimalist instruments, and then the layers are processed step by layer, until the interlude mood becomes full of intestines, with Zhang Hexuan's surging interpretation, so that the deep emotions behind Zhu Zi's concise words have a three-dimensional presentation, and finally the chanting of "My South, South", compared to the beginning, there is a trance-like feeling like another world.
Between the singer and the producer, it is actually the relationship between "Maxima" and "Bole"
In the Current Chinese music scene full of too many impetuous works, we see too many standardized and routine works, but it is rare to see Zhang Hexuan and Kang Zhuqing patiently polishing the "Coloring Book" bit by bit, six works are independent chapters, sprinkling different shades of color, and finally constructing the possibility of "singer Zhang Hexuan" to control a variety of styles - this possibility, at present, has not yet formed a too unique difference with the most representative Chinese high-quality singers in my heart, in the arrangement of stylization attempts, lyrics textual expression, There are still some "tepid" jerky feelings, but Kang Zhuqing, as a creator and producer, has indeed tapped the potential of Zhang Hexuan after "You Drunk Me", and she is helping Zhang Hexuan achieve a certain transformation from skill to emotion step by step. At the end of April, the soundtrack of the dance drama "Liufang" created by Kang Zhuqing and the soundtrack of the dance drama "Zhu Ziqing" will also be officially released, and the different versions of "Hurry" sung by Yu Kewei and Zhang Hexuan are also worth looking forward to.
I think that such Zhang Hexuan has officially unveiled his new chapter in the Chinese music scene through the "Coloring Book", if "Good Voice" is the talent and foundation, then the partnership between Zhang Hexuan and Kang Zhuqing will make me look forward to how a piece of beautiful jade can be carved out under the ingenuity of Bole.