Deng Lijun -The uncontested queen of 80s pop music

Some time ago, when I was riding in a car with a Chinese friend of mine, the driver put on some music to make the journey pass faster and turned to me and asked if I knew who was singing. I had no idea.

He said that the artist in question was Deng Lijun. I was still baffled - Deng who?

After a long pause my friend said that if you don't know who Deng Lijun is, you can't pride yourself on knowing anything about the Chinese culture. This was such a crushing statement that I had to quickly read up on the legendary pop icon.

Karaoke favorite

Deng Lijun (邓丽君) was the uncontested queen of the entire Chinese pop music scene of the 1980s and 90s. Deng, aka Teresa Teng, was the first artist in China to be dubbed a pop star. The singer died very young, but still remains one of the most beloved musical performers of all time.

Young Chinese today have done their homework and are familiar with her songs, now considered classics, which count among the most popular tunes played in karaoke bars across the nation.

A phenomenon by the name of Teresa Teng

Deng Lijun was born in Taiwan in 1953 (Jan. 29, 1953). She was incredibly talented, not just musically, but also in languages. Teresa spoke Mandarin and Cantonese, the dialects of Shanghai and Shandong, Taiwanese, English, Japan, French and Indonesian.

At the age of ten, Deng won her first singing contest and decided to concentrate all her efforts to building a career in music. Along with success came greater confidence and in 1965, when Teresa went to study at the Jilin school for girls in Taipei, she also made her debuts as a recording artist.

Deng's working pace was so fast that by 1968 she had churned out eight records. “Deng's voice” developed into a concept and the captivating starlet became a style icon for all young girls.

In 1970, Deng set her sights on Hong Kong and from there set her course for southeast Asia. Teresa Teng's name drew admiring sighs from fans from Singapore to Malaysia and Vietnam. Her career took a new turn a couple of years later when Polydor records managed to get her to agree to come to Japan for five years to perform to sold-out audiences.

Deng Lijun's family is originally from Hebei, but due to the inflamed relations between Taiwan and the mainland at the time, Teresa was never able to visit her parents' native province and thus never played a single concert in mainland China. This however, did not prevent the Chinese audiences from falling in love with her songs.

China's pop pioneer

From 1979, China took to the path of opening up to the outside world and Teng's career soared to news heights. One reason for Deng's immense success is likely to be the fact that at the time in question, pop music was such a novel and intriguing phenomenon in mainland China that the audiences were simply insatiable. And no wonder at that, remembering that the music of the previous decades had only consisted of political opera. Some people jokingly say that while Deng Xiaoping was the beacon of the nation in the day, at night, the other Deng, Deng Lijun, took over.

Deng Lijun's career reached its peak at the end of the 1980s, and in 1995 the starlet died of an asthma attack while vacationing in Thailand with her boyfriend. China's central television made history two days later by reporting on her death and airing numerous films of her life and concerts. Such a tribute would had been unheard of before 1995.

Deng Lijun's presence in the mental landscape of the Chinese could be compared to that of the likes of Elvis or Patsy Cline in America. Her voice is characterized as pure and natural, evoking a pristine creek running through an idyllic country village.

Deng Lijun's most famous songs include The Moon Represents My Heart (月亮代表我的心) and Tian mi mi (甜蜜蜜), which you can listen to in the video link at the top of the page.