Becoming Ting Shih-kuang (above) | Mahler Music Interviews

Ting Shih-kuang releases another new album for Christmas. It's Me on the Back” is a collection of Ting's original demos that have been circulating for a long time, newly compiled into a ‘creative a la carte’ album.

A demo is a sample of a song before it is included on a music album, and it is only after the song has been lyrically perfected, orchestrated and polished, and then finely recorded, and mixed and mastered, that it becomes an officially released song. Most of the songs from “It's Me on the Backside” have been performed and released by others over the past decade or so, only that these releases did not follow the demos as they were originally intended - some had their titles changed, and some only used Ting's music score to tell a different story in conjunction with the artist's project concepts. The vast majority of Ting's demos, on the other hand, have fully developed lyrics, a fledgling arrangement framework, and tell a complete story. These demos have been circulating on the internet for a few years, and were so beloved by fans that netizens asked for the demos to be officially released on the shelves, and Ting and the team captured the call of the listeners, and this was the beginning of Backside Is Me.

Another deeper motivation for “creating an a la carte album” was, as the album's text reads, “to make an a la carte album for the person I was at the beginning.” “Every era of myself has worked hard to make 'Backside Is Me' today.” In an exclusive interview with MusicCare, Ding Shiguang laments the sense of destiny that this album carries. And what was Ding Shikuang like in the beginning?

Middle schoolers who make albums

“A working class kid grows up to be a very ordinary person.” Since childhood, Ding Shiguang has been an ordinary person. He met Li Shuangzhou in kindergarten, and they became best friends in life and partners in music. The two wrote songs together in junior high school, popular in the era of Jacky Cheung and Zhou Hua Jian, Michael Jackson and Babyface were also their idols. Ding Shisheng Spectrum music, Li Shuangzhou wrote the lyrics, the above stars are their creative copy object, “shall not be able to do it, (age) is too young, and did not learn music.” Interest-driven creation, “is a blind try ...... inquisitive heart is hidden in those most innocent interests.” Ding Shiguang said. In his view, music is an open source thing, the listener listens to that musicians do, find ways to study which the son and daughter, after copying the creation, and then reverse the experience, the creation of the skills in a song dissected and try to improve the progress of the progress. “Technology is more advanced, you still have to do this (learn to make songs) today.” Since he was a child, he has been practicing the musical experiment of writing, arranging and singing his own songs, and “making an album” is something he has been doing since junior high school.

Middle school wrote songs about ideals, partings, and the emotional reveries of hapless imaginations, “very nerdy and very innocent ones.” Having assembled ten songs, they recorded them on tape using a dual-card recorder. “Handwriting the lyrics themselves.” Ting Shiguang recalls, “The words couldn't be written too small, so I wrote them on a big piece of paper, folded them up, like those cassette releases in that state, drew a picture, made a wrapper, and made it into my own album.” Several copies of the tape were made and distributed to classmates. High school to college, Ding Shiguang's songs are written more and more molded, “is a thing, began to be able to listen to it, dare to copy more copies to classmates as a souvenir.” Burning CDs replaced recording tapes, and handwritten lyric pages evolved into computerized printouts. The song “Lifetime Friend” from The Back Is Mine celebrates friendship - A childhood kite blew off its string / We console ourselves that floating is brave / But I trust that I've always trusted / You're my lifelong companion. This is a song written by Ding Shiguang and his wife, Ye Xie'er, to Li Shuang Zhou in 2010.

Ding Shiguang likes to write about real emotions, his past songs include his parents, his lover, and important people in his life, “Those are real emotions, I believe that when they come to the listener's ears, they may trigger a different story from mine, but there will be some similar feelings.” He lamented his intertwined life trajectory with Lee Shuang Zhou, “There is only one such friend in life from childhood, it's impossible to have a second one, that kind of fate is too marvelous.” They met by chance in kindergarten, read together, wrote songs together, both liked to play soccer, and when they stepped into the music industry, “they signed the same copyright company together, and he wrote the lyrics and I composed the music, and all the way through the form of such a partnership, and so over, the fate is very incredible!”

'Catherine', a very high start.

The dream of making an album certainly didn't stop with the self-importance of his student days. University student Ding Shiguang sought out the address published in a magazine and walked into a record company in Beijing, which he visited with a USB flash drive loaded with his self-penned songs, “at the time it was still called ‘Big Five Records’.” What do you want? --Looking at this young man from out of town, the record company people were a bit confused. “I have songs that I made and sang myself, so I'll give you guys a listen to see if there's any interest, if there's any ideas ......” The adults were kind of polite to him, only they didn't contact him later to release an album, ”but at that time I think the songs I wrote were pretty good, and they weren't that bad.” No progress was made in releasing songs, so Ding Shiguang went back to school. Was it frustrating? “Frustrated? Young people don't understand frustration, and there's nothing to lose... I like those songs myself anyway. It's good to have (the opportunity), it's okay if I don't, it doesn't affect my love for (music).” It was also in college that Ding Shiguang and his classmates formed a band, a pop-rock band. “Pop is a little bit more, we don't do too heavy rock like the other kids, we still like the aesthetically pleasing melodic stuff.” Ting Shiguang works as the lead singer and rhythm guitarist, writing and singing his own songs with his friend, another guitarist and band leader. In addition to taking the stage on campus, they traveled to Beijing for band competitions. Band time lasted two years, graduated, and broke up. “The days spent together are pretty good memories.” But Ding Shiguang's ideal was never to be in a band, even if the band inspired him to a certain extent - to know how each instrument works and how it fits together. “I'm still going to make my own music, that [goal] is still clear, to sing by myself.” In 2004, Ding Shiguang's self-recorded CD fell into Tao's hands after being forwarded to him by a friend, and for the first time Tao included someone else's composition - “Catherine” composed by Ding Shiguang - on his album, which “seems to be a very high starting point even now.” In the same year, Ding Shiguang signed a contract with a copyright company as a songwriter, and has since officially entered the music industry. The dream of making an album “Catherine” was certainly more than just a student's dream. College student Ding Shiguang searched for the address published in a magazine and walked into a record company in Beijing, where he visited with a USB flash drive loaded with his self-penned songs, “which was still called ‘Top Five Records’ at the time.” What do you want? --Looking at this young man from out of town, the record company people were a bit confused. “I have songs that I made and sang myself, so I'll give you guys a listen to see if there's any interest, if there's any ideas ......” The adults were kind of polite to him, only they didn't contact him later to release an album, ”but at that time I think the songs I wrote were pretty good, and they weren't that bad.” No progress was made in releasing songs, so Ding Shiguang went back to school. Was it frustrating? “Frustrated? Young people don't understand frustration, and there's nothing to lose... I like those songs myself anyway. It's good to have (the opportunity), it's okay if I don't, it doesn't affect my love for (music).” It was also in college that Ding Shiguang and his classmates formed a band, a pop-rock band. “Pop is a little bit more, we don't do too heavy rock like the other kids, we still like the aesthetically pleasing melodic stuff.” Ting Shiguang works as the lead singer and rhythm guitarist, writing and singing his own songs with his friend, another guitarist and band leader. In addition to taking the stage on campus, they traveled to Beijing for band competitions. Band time lasted two years, graduated, and broke up. “The days spent together are pretty good memories.” But Ding Shiguang's ideal was never to be in a band, even if the band inspired him to a certain extent - to know how each instrument works and how it fits together. “I'm still going to make my own music, that [goal] is still clear, to sing by myself.” In 2004, Ding Shiguang's self-recorded CD fell into Tao's hands after being forwarded to him by a friend, and for the first time Tao included someone else's composition - “Catherine” composed by Ding Shiguang - on his album, which “seems to be a very high starting point even now.” In the same year, Ding Shiguang signed a contract with a copyright company as a songwriter, and has since officially entered the music industry.

Ding Shiguang ...... Who is it? 

Paranoid Ding Shiguang:

Let the Soul Sing for the Soul Yeh Hee Yeh, Love Yourself at Last