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Profile on Jerry Chu Jerry is a veteran Taiwan culture worker. He has an EMBA from National Chiao Tung University and specializes in strategic planning and integration. In recent years, Jerry is deeply into research and application of the cultural creativity industry. He has worked with media groups such as Chinatimes News Group, CommonWealth Magazine, and United Daily News Group. He is currently the general manager at HanGuang Creativity Art Corp. and instructor in the Chinese Faculty at both Yuan Ze University and Chinese Culture University. He shares his knowledge in classical literature and cultural creativity with members of HanGuang Vocal Band. He is currently promoting charity, cultural creativity, and Han literature, and he hopes to share his own version of culture with young people.
Interview Q&A
We learned from our interview with Director Chu about the founding history of HanGuang Vocal Band. And we were deeply impressed by how much hard work HanGuang Education Foundation has put into promoting Han Literature. They have been working relentlessly in promoting Chinese culture, hoping to make more people falling in love with it. The band’s use a cappella as a medium to promote Chinese culture aroused our curiosity, and we were able to sing along after a few tries. Therefore, we will not forget Director Chu’s words of encouragement to nurture our appreciation for music and Chinese culture.
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Road towards becoming the general manager of HanGuang Vocal Band |
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HanGuang Vocal Band was founded by HanGuang Education Foundation less than three years ago. Since HanGuang Education Foundation is on a mission to promote Chinese characters and classical poetries, I suggested using a cappella as a medium. The foundation agreed and hired me as the general manager. It is a very demanding job. I am responsible for integrating and coordinating everything that has to do with the band to make sure everything works smoothly. |
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The founding of HanGuang Vocal Band |
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The founder of the band is the executive boss of our company. After that, we needed to have teachers, band members, and workers to run this group. The group also needs a manager responsible for all the administrative works. Everyone needs to assume a particular job so works are shared. The band has a nickname of ‘HanGuang Drill’ because the young and creative band members want to bring the band a livelier image. Our official name is still HanGuang Vocal Band. |
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Bittersweets of being a general manager |
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There is always hard work in every profession, and we just have to come up with ways to solve it and make ourselves better. When the band performs well on stage, we are happy and all wear and tear will dissipate. Besides being the general manager of the band, I am also a professor. These two jobs do not conflict each other because we want more people to learn and understand about HanGuang Vocal Band and Chinese culture. As a result, we try different ways to reach out to different audiences, not just a few individuals. |
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Meeting A Cappella |
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People prefer different types of music through the passing of time. Human voice is the purest and the most beautiful, and it can imitate different sounds such as a drum, trumpet, Chinese 2-string fiddle, bugs, or birds. Even without instruments, human voice is capable of such amazing things, and the possibilities are limitless. We collect different sounds and combine them with the band to create a brand-new sound with many variations. Today, we combine a cappella with classical poetries, and this is a very special way of interpretation that brings creativity to the audience. For example, our songs, lyrics, and band make up are drastically different from that of other bands, and that makes us really unique. |
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What’s HanGuang Vocal Band like in your eyes? |
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Besides poetic lyrics and pure human vocal singing, there is also body language and stage choreography to present a perfect performance through multimedia. These are our four pillars in singing, and they are also our biggest selling point. Our selected members all have some background in music, but they still work hard to learn and practice. Even though they come from different backgrounds, they still come to Taiwan Choral Music Center for regular band practices. They are really a hard-working bunch. |
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Perfect presentation on stage |
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If there is only one person performing on stage, everything is relatively easy to manage. But when it becomes an a cappella group, then team congruency and band practices become important. We are not limited to poetries from the Tang Dynasty, verses from the Song Dynasty, nor drama from the Yuan Dynasty. As long as the material is classical Chinese literature, we may consider it in our next performance. However, in order to convey the essence of these classical literatures, band members must have a clear understanding of them, then they are able to come up with ways to express their essence through body language and facial expression. This takes a lot of time to practice. |
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The past, present, and future of HanGuang |
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In the past, since band members came from different places, it was hard for them to meet up and practice, and we were forced to forfeit some performance opportunities. Gradually, the more everyone got to know each other, fewer problems like that occurred. The only problem they face now is how to make the band better. We took dance lessons, for instance, just to make our on stage performance reaching a higher level. The biggest challenge we face now is how to promote the band and let more people hear about us. We hope people can learn more about these classical poetries through our voice and songs. Furthermore, I hope one day we will be able to shine on international stage and let the world know that there is an a cappella band in Taiwan called HanGuang Vocal Band. That is the founding purpose of this band by the foundation, and I wish the band will continue its hard work. Let’s keep it up. |
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Words of encouragement to children |
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Learning a cappella is something fun. It would be nice to learn it as a hobby. But the prerequisite is that you must love music. A cappella is performed as a group, and only through group harmony will we be able to hear the most beautiful human vocal singing. |
Afterthoughts
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Cherry:
During the interview, the general manager answered all our questions with great detail. It looked as if he was answering ten questions when we only asked him one. In addition, he did not deliberately make things difficult for us and answered our questions with patience. As it was our first interview experience, we were all tensed. However, it was such a memorable interview experience for us because the general manager was so relaxed and happy. As I was too nervous, I did not interact much with the general manager during the interview. This is something that I would like to improve on next time. |
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Vanilla:
This time, Cherry and I interviewed the general manager and the members. Maybe this was the first interview for Cherry, so she looked a little nervous, but she still did her best. I gave a hand to her when she needed help, too. By the way, all of the interviewees were very kind, so I thought today’s interview was really great! It reminded me when I was in fifth grade, the first time I went out and interviewed the group members. I was pretty nervous, but thanks for the experience that time, I can conquer the fear and smile while I was talking to people now! I think there is still something that I need to improve, like sometimes I will forget to talk more with them, didn’t ask the questions very well, or my voice will be too soft when I was recording. |
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Source: the Beautiful Voices
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