鄧雨賢 (1906~1944)

His life

The great composer of Taiwan traditional folk songs, Deng Yusian (鄧雨賢), was born at Longtan (龍潭) Township of Taoyuan (桃園) County in 1906, and passed away at Qionglin (芎林) Township of Hsinchu (新竹) County in 1944, at the age of 39.

Deng Yusian came from a family of superior extraction. Many of the elder members in his family had passed the national examination held by government, and three of them, including his grandfather and father, got the high degree titled "Xiu Cai" (秀才).

At the age of 15, in order to comply with his father's expectation, Deng Yusian entered "The Taipei Normal School", a school of teacher trainings. In those days he started to learn music since the school placed much importance on musical education.

Deng Yusian graduated from the normal school when 20 and started his career as an elementary school teacher in Taipei. Years later, due to unable to constrain from the passion for music, he decided to go to Japan for more thorough music knowledge and finally entered a ballad school in Tokyo to study composition theory.

When finishing the quest for music in Japan, Deng Yusian came back to Taiwan. One year later he acquired a chance to devote himself to music career. He was recruited to join "The Columbia Records" company as a professional composer. In 1930s, Deng Yusian had composed many successful songs which obtained great popularity and turned him into the most famous composer at that time.

Many of his works are still widely sung nowadays. The most famous four songs are: "Red of the four seasons" (四季紅), "Sad mood under the moonlight" (月夜愁), "Expectation in the spring wind" (望春風), and "Flower in the rainy night" (雨夜花).

胡美紅 - 雨夜花
http://2.mms.vlog.xuite.net/media/home2/27/d8/13467974/50026/X5uF5X-2915712.flv

From 1895 Taiwan was ruled by Japan. In 1937, Japan government started to carry out a movement called "The Emperor's People" in Taiwan. The usage of Taiwanese native language was absolutely restricted. People were only allowed to speak Japanese. Songs were only allowed to be sung with Japanese lyrics.

Japan government rewrote some of Deng Yusian's works in Japanese lyrics and used them as military songs. Despite being a melody composer and had never written any lyrics, Deng Yusian felt very upset about the abuse of his works. He didn't want his music to be sung in Japanese. He didn't want his music to be used for praising Japan emperor. He regarded his music to be an exclusive property which should only belongs to Taiwanese.

Later on, Japan government forced Deng Yusian to write new songs with Japanese lyrics for military use. In order to live, he could not but yield himself and wrote a couple of new songs which were published with a new Japanese pen name. Maybe it was his final helpless principle - not to use his chinese name for those new compromised works.

Having a depressed life under "The Emperor's People" movement for two years, Deng Yusian finally gave up his music career and quitted the job in records company. He moved to a remote village in Qionglin (芎林) and went back to elementary school as a teacher. In Qionglin (芎林), the last few years of his life, he wrote some new songs but never published them by his chinese name.

As a result of heavy illness, Deng Yusian died at the age of 39. It was in 1944, just one year before Japan was defeated and returned Taiwan back in The Second World War. Although Deng Yusian was unable to meet the freedom of Taiwan, his music will last for long to caress our heart.

David Darling & Ketil Bjørnstad - 望春風 (1996)
http://2.mms.vlog.xuite.net/media/home2/27/d8/13467974/50026/r5z7au-2915989.flv

Memorial places about him

桃園縣客家文化館 (位於龍潭 設有鄧雨賢音樂紀念館)
http://163.29.212.100/hakka/index.asp

桃園縣客家文化館 鄧雨賢數位博物館
http://www2.tyccc.gov.tw/dys/

鄧雨賢音樂文化公園 (位於芎林)
http://www.wretch.cc/blog/chenhn/16702183
http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/waterschool/article?mid=25756&prev=-1&next=25731

Various media reports/performances about him

Webpages

台語歌謠的奇葩 鄧雨賢
http://www.taiwan123.com.tw/musicface/face03-2.htm

月娘笑阮憨大獃 台灣福斯特鄧雨賢
http://www.taiwan123.com.tw/musicface/face03-1.htm

大家作伙彈同調 鄧雨賢先生所帶給我的聯想
http://www.taiwan123.com.tw/musicface/face03-3.htm

鄧雨賢 @ wikipedia
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%84%A7%E9%9B%A8%E8%B3%A2

桃園縣政府製播的鄧雨賢紀錄片

part1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6HRRRMaU3g
part2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQXK4b6KJlk
part3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv19LnxW0bA
part4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYMPeIWdkfo
part5 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6Xdxbhfh8A
part6 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhK7iBHEcG8
part7 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsGe51dsP5Q

四月望雨 鄧雨賢音樂劇官方網站

http://aprilrain.allmusic-mag.net/index.html