The music of Teresa Teng

I got to know the music of Teresa Teng when I was watching a 1996 Hong-Kong-Chinese love movie called Tian mi mi (English title: Comrades, almost a love story, German title: Hong Kong Love Affair).

You'll probably listen to some of Teresa Teng's most favourite songs (Tian mi mi and others) when visiting a Chinese restaurant. Teresa Teng used to be a very famous singer in the chinese community.

It is said that Teresa Teng had been just as well famous in Japan. This is pretty surprising as she had to start from scratch when she arrived in Japan.

I think Teresa Teng must have been a lady with a lot of style from what I heard. It seems that she was a sensitive person and walked her life for whatever reasons on a pretty small ridge.

As it seems, there was no one to accompany her on her walk there.

I think every sensitive person deserves to be accompanied by a comrade.

Which brings me back to the movie Tian mi mi.

Deep impact of a fridge

Today, a copper fridge released by a space probe named Deep Impact ("the car") intentionally hit a comet named Tempel 1. This is pretty much the truth.

The complete space probe was lifted into earth orbit and released into space some 172 days ago with a speed of about 10.2 m/s (37,000 km/h or 20,000 miles/h). It took a big amount of propulsion energy to get it up to this speed.

The produced thrust was big enough to get the probe into space and let her leave earth gravity. However, it wouldn't have been big enough to directly escape from our solar system. For major deceleration or acceleration manoevers, Deep Impact would have needed the assistance of other planets of our solar system.

Alternatively one could have taken an additional rocket into space but that was no serious option. ("If it's difficult to take a car into orbit, how would one be able to take a big truck there..."). Any time consuming deceleration or acceleration manoevers were abolished for Deep Impact.

As a result, Deep Impact ("the car") was shot into space without brakes but with a copper fridge on his loading space.

Europe started a similar space probe named Rosetta in 2004 for going to a comet named Tschurjumow-Gerasimenko. This mission will complement the direct approach of Deep Impact. It is intended to perform a soft landing on the comet's surface in 2014. It has no own brakes either. However, it uses the other planets of our solar system to speed up to the same speed as the target comet (as a "free-rider"). Disadvantage with Rosetta: It takes a hell of a time.

I wonder if these two missions will bring any reasonable results for the human kind apart from being great PR successes ? Am I an ignoramus ?

Heavy summer rain

This afternoon there was a heavy summer rain in town. It also gave my neighbourhood a visit. I was pretty incompetent freezing it on the photo. Well, you must use your imagination. Look at the roof of the other house... The rain drops looked like half transparent pieces of a big rope.

Pretty neat, as long as you're inside, of course.

Reaching our hearts

Today I made an interesting observation about band singers.
Actually, I made this interesting observation in combination with an additional observation that I did yesterday.

The thing was: Yesterday evening I was listening to a live concert of a pretty known pretty new German band called Silbermond (Silvermoon), http://www.silbermond.de. The female singer was very communicative even picking one guy with a fan T-Shirt out of the audience and inviting him onto the stage for a while.

However, generally the audience was treated like a body, i.e. spoken to as "you guys here in...". Unfortunately (and probably understandable), this is pretty usual and one has no right to lament on this.

What made this interesting, however, was that the singing was - well - _allright_, possibly even good if you'd been a fan of that band.

Now, today I was visiting another concert of a local Big Band, http://jass-concert-band.de. They were performing very skillfully. The female singers were rotating and their singing extremly well.

Their voices were just great. No supporting music needed, they hit the tones. They faded, they rose, they were so technically good. Them being your pilots and your plane would never crash.

However, one interesting aspect caught my eye:

Neither of the band singers (not yesterdays, not todays) really reached the hearts of the audiences. Nor did they even try.

Of course, one might say: Well, why should they want to get to your heart ? All right: But isn't that what's music is about ? In my honest opinion music is not mainly a profession or for fun: It's for getting in contact with our feelings. So, in my point of view, these great singers just missed a chance, a chance to become immortal, a chance to leave a trace.

But why did they fail to reach the hearts of the audience and what could they have done to take advantage of the situation and top their performances by really getting through to the hearts of the listeners ?

Let's look at the singers of todays Big Band: These singers were totally balanced and listenening to themselves, very concentrated, very inwardly directed. They could play with their voices, let it steplessly fade or rise and highlight certain tones. But just the sounds actually left their lips.

No look for the world around really, never showing that they were aware that there is a world outside of their heads.

What they didn't do is: At no point of time did they try to play with their voices in direction to the audiences. So, I think that's the answer: To take the audience for serious.

If you're an experienced and balanced singer, this should be possible for you.

The feeling I had was: The female singer, let's call her Susi, bridged a gap of air of about 95%. Of course, the sound got ahead but not the feeling. Too bad, as it just would have needed a little push.

The second singer, let's call her Lena, in that regard was worse: The air behaved like foggy cotton to her voice. The emeotions got stuck and were sucked away some 80% past her lips. And again I'm not talking about the sound here but just about the emotional aspects.

My personal conclusion is:

• The singers were not aware of this emotional gap.

• The rest of the audience did not realize this gap (and therefore gave inadequate feedback to the singers).

• The audience was polite.

• The audience was not used to and prepared for receiving emotional broadcasts from a singer.

• My own perception might have been incorrect.

• I was too critical.

• I saw possibilities that nobody was really interested in sending nor receiving.

• The singers didn't want to build an emotional thread to the audiences hearts.

To make my point a little clearer:
Imagine you were a singer: Would other people be able to hear your singing from a distance ?
How far does your voice carry ? 1 meter, 2 meters, 10 meters ?
Can you vary the distance that you want your voice to carry ?
Do you know what I mean ?
Can you point your voice to certain points in the room ?
Can you talk to a single person in the crowd over a distance of 10 meters ?

The answer is: Of course you can !
Ever tried to shout at someone on the other side of the train station ?
Ever tried to talk to someone on the other side of the river ?
How did you do it ? By the power of your voice ?
Or possibly by the clarity and focus of your voice ?
That's what I mean.
Talking to the needle in the crowd.

I think, a singer should be able to use his voice like a tool and also should use this ability. For his own sake and immortality and for the joy of his/her audience.