 Zhou
Xuan (August 1, 1918 - September 22, 1957) was a popular Chinese singer and film
actress. Zhou was born as Su Pu and was separated from her natural parents at a
young age; she was raised by adoptive parents. She spent her entire life
searching for her biological parents and her parentage was never established
until after her death. At 13 she took Zhou Xuan as her stage name, 'Xuan', which
means beautiful jade in Chinese.
Zhou started acting 1935, but she achieved stardom in 1937 in Street Angel, when
director Yuan Muzhi cast her as one of the leads as a singing girl.
She became known as "The Golden Voice" and was a popular singing star in the
late 1930s and 1940s, one of the "seven great singing stars." "Golden Voice" was
Zhou's nickname to commend her singing talents after a competition for the most
popular singers in Shanghai, where she came in second. Zhou rapidly became the
most famous and marketable popular singer in the gramophone era up to her death,
singing many famous tunes from her own movies. Her frail but eminently musical
voice captured the hearts of millions of Chinese of her time.
After introducing "Shanghai at Night", Zhou returned to Shanghai. She spent the
next few years in and out of mental institutions. Through the years, Zhou led a
complicated and unhappy life marked by her failed marriages, illegitimate
children and suicide attempts.
She died in Shanghai of encephalitis following a nervous breakdown, at the age
of only 39, having made a total of 43 movies. Her favorite film was always
Street Angel. This contained two theme songs: "Four Seasons Song" and "The
Wandering Songstress" which enjoyed long-lasting popularity. To this day, Zhou
Xuan's songs still remain a staple in many Golden Oldies collections in Mandarin
popular music.
Her biography is told in adapted materials. One of them is TVB's Song Bird in
1989, starring Nnadia Chan as Zhou Xuan and Leon Lai as her lover. In this
series, Xuan's songs were re-written in Cantonese, sung by her in solo. In
duets, she sang with him in the serial while (under the limits of Crown Records)
Deric Wan replaced Lai's vocals in the soundtrack album.
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