Jazz Development in Hong Kong
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Last updated October, 2019
(This article was originally a summary of my presentation at the 5th JEN Conference in Dallas in January 2014, which was presented at the Asian Jazz Discussion Panel in Zhuhai in September 2014. After five years of rapid development in the Hong Kong jazz scene, the information was updated in October, 2019. This survey article will continue to be updated from time to time. Inputs from jazz friends are welcome.)
Jazz in Hong Kong was long considered entertainment purely for Westerners, performed at hotels and nightclubs by Filipino musicians. It was not until the 1980s that jazz became more localized. With an increasing number of local professional jazz musicians and the establishment of local jazz clubs, jazz was taken more seriously in Hong Kong as a performing art form. Internationally renowned jazz artists featured in arts festivals and performed in concert halls for the general public.
In search of a musical expression to represent Hong Kong’s cross-cultural identity, new fusions of jazz and Chinese music have been developing among young local jazz musicians. In recent years, jazz has started to become part of music education.
The following discussion focuses on the historical and stylistic development of jazz in Hong Kong from its origins in Shanghai to the present. Six periods are identified.
1. Pre-WWII Shanghai (1920s–40s)
Jazz in China started in Shanghai in the late 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. The two leading figures in the early development of jazz in Shanghai were the American jazz trumpeter Buck Clayton and the Chinese songwriter Li Jinhui (黎錦暉). Clayton and his big band, The Harlem Gentlemen, went to Shanghai in 1935 and left in 1937. Clayton and Li collaborated. The early Shanghai pop songs (shidaiqu 時代曲 ‘songs of the times’) were mostly songs from the movies, with pentatonic melodies accompanied by big band.
2. Post-WWII Hong Kong (1945–1960s)
After WWII, the Shanghai music industry moved to Hong Kong. The post-war popular music of Hong Kong was an inheritance and a continuation of the old Shanghai pop song tradition. Hong Kong became the new center of the Mandarin shidaiqu, a trend that lasted until the late 1960s.
3. Western pop music influence (1960s–70s)
The 1960s was a transitional decade for Hong Kong culture. Musically, there was the co-existence of Cantonese opera, Chinese folk music, Mandarin pop songs, English pop songs, and some Cantonese pop songs (mostly cover versions of English language pop songs) among the general public. While the big band jazz element was still lingering in Mandarin pop song arrangements in the 1960s, younger audiences loved the latest pop rock music from the West. After the Beatles visited Hong Kong in 1964, the local guitar band scene started.
4. Canto-pop Golden Age (1970s–80s)
Original Cantonese pop songs started gaining widespread popularity in the mid-1970s. During the Golden Age of Canto-pop, the Shanghai-style Mandarin pop songs became outdated. Cover versions of old Shanghai sung by Taiwanese pop singer Teresa Tang adopted the soft rock arrangement instead of the traditional big band arrangement. Without the big band arrangement of the Mandarin pop songs, little jazz remained in the Hong Kong music industry. The only places to hear live jazz in the 1960s and 1970s were the hotels and nightclubs where Filipino musicians performed. The clientele were mostly Westerners.
5. Flourishing of Hong Kong Jazz (1980s–90s)
From the 1980s, jazz began to flourish as an art form in Hong Kong. Six aspects can be traced:
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a. Establishment of local jazz clubs: The first jazz club in Hong Kong, Ned Kelly’s Last Stand, opened in 1972 in Tsimshatsui and played New Orleans jazz every night. Two jazz clubs opened during the 1980s: Rick’s Café (1980–1987) and the Hong Kong Jazz Club (1989–2002).
b. Emergence and prominence of local jazz musicians: Local musicians started to enter the jazz scene in the 1980s and 1990s. The two leading Hong Kong jazz musicians were the guitarist Eugene Pao and the pianist Ted Lo.
​ c. Besides local jazz musicians, the number of expats also increased. Expats active in the Hong Kong jazz scene in the 1980s include Ric Halstead (sax), David Packer (piano), Rudy Balbuena (bass), Paul Candelaria (bass), and Guy Le Claire (e. guitar); those who were active from the 1990s include Anthony Fernandes (drums), Sylvain Gagnon (a. bass), Peter Scherr (a. bass), Steve Sacks (sax), and Christopher Lier (piano).
d. Visits from international jazz artists: World renowned jazz artists who have performed in Hong Kong include Wayne Shorter, Ornette Coleman, Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea, McCoy Tyner, Jack DeJohnette, Eddie Gomez, Jan Garbarek, Wynton Marsalis, Betty Carter, John McLaughlin, Arturo Sandoval, Joe Henderson, Paul Motian, Joe Zawinul, Brad Mehldau, John Scofield, Joe Lovano, Dave Holland, Al Foster, and Michael Brecker.
e. Hong Kong’s first jazz festival, SELECT Live Under The Sky (1987), was organized by Peter Lee and originated from Japan. The festival had a five-year life span in Hong Kong and was a fashionable event among celebrities and movie stars at the time. Besides captivating an audience of two to three thousand every year at the Queen Elizabeth Stadium, it had a great influence on local musicians.[i] The Hong Kong International Jazz and Blues Festival (1994) was a two-day event presented and organized by the then Hong Kong Jazz Club.[ii]
f. The Saturday Night Jazz Orchestra kept traditional jazz standards alive while the local jazz scene moved toward fusion. Other local big bands included the Happy-Go-Lucky Orchestra, Basic Notes Jazz Big Band, Stray Katz Big Band, Lando Bernal’s Big Broad Band, and Tony Carpio Big Band.
6. Recent Developments:
After 1997, there was greater cultural awareness among Hong Kong musicians. A continuation of the development from the 1980s and 1990s led to the establishment of jazz organizations, more jazz festivals and events, and the emergence of new trends, namely Canto-jazz, Chinese-jazz fusion, and jazz education.
a. New jazz clubs and venues: Since 2000, clubs featuring jazz have included Blue Door (2001–2007), Peel Fresco (2007–present), Backstage, Gecko, Cafe Deco, and Grappa’s Cellar (closed). The Fringe Club, a venue for alternative performing arts, also features jazz on a regular basis. More recent venues for jazz performances include 1563 at the East, Lost Stars Livehouse & Eatery, Hotel Stage, Sense 99, 細蓉, Tai Kwun, and Free Space West Kowloon, etc.
b. Local and expat musicians: Local musicians emerging since the beginning of this century and currently active in the Hong Kong jazz scene include (not in any particular order) Teriver Cheung (e. guitar), Tommy Ho (e. guitar), Wilson Lam (e. guitar), Skip Moy (e. guitar), Justin Siu (a. Bass), Tsang Tak-Hong (e. Bass), Wong Tak-Chung (e. Bass), Lui Ngao-Yuen (a. Bass), Jason Cheng (piano), Patrick Lui (piano), Rod Chui (piano), Bernard Hui (piano), Joyce Cheung (piano), Dean Li (drums), Siu Hin-Chuen (tenor sax), Angelita Li (vocals), Elaine Liu (vocals), and Ginger Kwan (vocals), etc. Expat musicians who have entered the Hong Kong jazz scene since the beginning of this century include (not in any particular order) Blaine Whittaker (2003–2007, alto sax), Rickard Malmsteen (e. bass), Scott Dodd (a. & e. bass), Mike Carr (a. bass), Dan Lavelle (guitar), Robbin Harris (drums), Jim Schneider (piano), Howard McCrary (piano and vocals), Allen Youngblood (piano), Bob Mocarsky (piano), Jennifer Palor (vocals), and Mia Samira (vocals) etc.
c. Local jazz organizations and festivals since 2000 include the Hong Kong Jazz Association and Hong Kong International Jazz Festival (both founded by Peter Lee in 2000 and 2008, respectively),[iii] the Hong Kong Jazz Festival 2005 (a one-off event), the Hong Kong Summer Jazz Festival (founded by Clarence Chang in 2011), and the Hong Kong Green Jazz Festival (a platform for young and upcoming local jazz musicians since 2012). In addition to these jazz festivals, the Hong Kong Arts Festival also features concerts by international jazz artists. In recent years, West Kowloon District features jazz as one of their major cultural activities. Hong Kong Fringe Club also organizes Jazz-Go-Central, Jazz-Go-Fringe 2018-19, a festival of a series of concerts and educational activities, besides their regular jazz programming.
d. Emergence of Canto-jazz: Many Canto-pop songs have become ‘standards’ in Hong Kong and a new source of jazz arrangements. The earliest Canto-jazz album was Hong Kong Jazz Standards by Danny Summer in 1998. Since then, other Canto-jazz albums have been released, such as So Good Show Live by William So (2001), Salute Deux by Prudence Liew and Angelita Li (2002), Chivax Jazz Concert by Gold Label Singers (2007), So I Sing Live by William So (2008), Private Corner by Jacky Cheung (2010), and Somewhere I Belong by Karen Mok (2013). Younger pop singers, including Ivana Wong, Eman Lam, Bianca Wu, and Kay Tse, have also used jazz arrangements in their albums.
e. Emergence of Chinese-jazz fusion:
In the search for an artistic expression to reflect the cross-cultural identity of young jazz musicians, a new form of Chinese jazz fusion has emerged that combines Chinese folk elements and instruments with contemporary jazz harmony, funk rhythm, and free jazz improvisation.
The earliest Chinese jazz fusion album in Hong Kong was Sketches (1987) produced by Ric Halstead. The most famous current Chinese fusion group in Hong Kong is SIU2, which combines Chinese guzheng and sheng with electronic instruments. The fusion of Chinese erhu and jazz is demonstrated in When Jazz Meets Erhu (2011), produced by prominent erhu musician Jessie Hou. Younger Chinese jazz fusion groups include Mo-Men-T, the Nuevo Jazz Quartet, and the Pentatonic Jazz Fusion Band. Boundless Groove, the recent crossover concert between WUJI (Chinese plucked string) Ensemble and MO-MEN-T is the latest development of this new trend, where the fusion is beyond instrumentation. It is a true integration of both musical styles with genuine interplay among musicians from both groups.
f. Jazz Education:
The former Hong Kong Institute of Education (HKIED) led the way in jazz education in Hong Kong. The Jazz Ensemble was invited to perform at the 5th Jazz Education Network Conference 2014, and was well received. The group with change of personnel was renamed Pentatonic Jazz Fusion Band in 2015 and started to perform in public. They were invited back to perform at JEN Conference in 2017, and was highly praised by American jazz experts. Former members of this group pursued further jazz studies in the U. S. Siu Hin-Chuen (tenor sax), the band leader, received a MMME in Jazz Pedagogy from Capital University and became the first certified jazz educator in Hong Kong. Samuel Chan (piano & drums) graduated from The Collective School of Music and is an active drummer in the local scene. Andy Lo (piano) is currently studying at Berklee College of Music.
After HKIEd being retitled to EdUHK in 2016, the EdUHK Jazz Ensemble under new coaching of Lui Ngao-Yuen, received more opportunities to perform in public and improved significantly. The recent graduates of the EdUHK Ensemble formed a new band, C O3 Collectives, and continued to perform in public. Lui also coordinates a Hong Kong Youth Jazz Collective Training Program to offer systematic training of jazz ensemble performance to local young musicians, outside the academia. Prominent local jazz musicians, such as Ted Lo and Teriver Cheung, are also actively involved in educational workshops and master classes. Alex Au produces an online educational Jazz Piano series featuring local jazz pianists, similar to what Marian McPartland did several decades ago in the U. S. Online jazz instructions offered by other local jazz musicians are also available on Facebook.
​Conclusion:
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The elevation of jazz from pure entertainment to artistic expression and music education in Hong Kong society echoes a similar shift in American society a few decades earlier. The Chinese-jazz fusion is a significant contribution to world music culture. Jazz education is essential in training better jazz musicians, educators and audiences for the future.The development of Jazz in Hong Kong is striving toward a healthier and brighter future, as evident in the increase of performance and educational activities, more involvement of younger musicians, as well as the emergence of a contemporary Chinese and Jazz fusion to represent Hong Kong’s unique cultural identity.
[i] http://www.hkijf.com/en/about-hkijf-2.
[ii] http://www.hkijf.com/en/about-hkijf-2.
[iii] Peter Lee, interview, November 28, 2013.