At Taiwan’s premier music competition, artists went political with their tunes and lyrics.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Social actions have lengthy used music to unfold messages and rally help. Musicians from throughout Taiwan gathered within the southern port metropolis of Kaohsiung just lately to attempt to remind folks of the precarious geopolitical scenario during which they discover their island. Ashish Valentine reviews.
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ASHISH VALENTINE, BYLINE: Final weekend, tens of 1000’s of followers gathered to see among the greatest Taiwan’s music scene has to supply. The competition, which acquired some native authorities funding, took over the most important harbor in Taiwan – therefore its title, Megaport.
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VALENTINE: Though they got here right here to blow off steam, escalating tensions between Taiwan and China had been on many followers’ and artists’ minds. Final month, Taiwan’s president, Lai Ching-te, labeled Beijing as a, quote, “hostile international pressure.” Many bands urged followers to remain united, saying this is not the primary time Taiwan’s folks have risked their lives for a greater future.
Taking the stage on the competition’s second day, rock band Sorry Youth stunned everybody midway by way of their set by debuting a cartoon based mostly on a narrative even a child may acknowledge. Three little pigs – Taiwanese pigs, that’s – speak in regards to the information, whereas a sure massive, dangerous wolf lurks within the background.
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UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR #1: (As character, by way of interpreter) You guys actually suppose there will be a battle?
VALENTINE: They speak about sending their children overseas earlier than the third little pig interrupts, saying they need to keep and defend their residence.
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UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR #1: (As character, by way of interpreter) However what can we do? We’re simply regular folks. What energy do we now have?
UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR #2: (As character, by way of interpreter) Only one strange particular person has no energy. However what about 10,000 strange folks, 100,000, one million? So many individuals sacrificed themselves so we will dwell the way in which we do now. The remainder is as much as us.
VALENTINE: The band launched right into a music referred to as “Justice In Time.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SORRY YOUTH SONG, “JUSTICE IN TIME”)
VALENTINE: It pays tribute to generations of activists who resisted 4 many years of dictatorship, which solely led to 1987, and guarantees that future generations will hold their hard-won democracy secure. They weren’t the one artists who fearful a couple of potential Chinese language invasion. Hip-hop artist Yang Shu-ya’s single “2045” wonders what struggling for democracy would imply in Taiwan if every thing burns to ashes.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “2045”)
YANG SHU-YA: (Rapping in non-English language).
VALENTINE: She imagines Taiwan as a battle zone below Chinese language occupation, primary freedoms gone. Not everybody enjoying at Megaport was so ahead, although. Yang says it is a results of bigger tensions within the music scene.
YANG: (By way of interpreter) So many artists from Taiwan resolve they should go to China to develop their careers.
VALENTINE: The end result, she says, is barely a handful dare to talk up overtly. However Yang says she has little interest in going to China or enjoying by their guidelines.
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YANG: (By way of interpreter) There’s by no means been a separation between music and politics. Music is political.
VALENTINE: For most of the artists and followers at Megaport, they’re going to use the competition to rejoice and protest for so long as they will.
For NPR Information, that is Ashish Valentine in Kaohsiung, Taiwan.
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