Relive the rise of Cantopop from 1970s to 2000s at Tai Kwun this Summer!
Whether you’re a Cantopop fan or just curious to discover Hong Kong iconic musical genre and cultural phenomenon, don’t miss Tai Kwun’s exhibition Soundtrack of Our Lives: Joseph Koo x James Wong x the Rise of Cantopop from 11 July to 28 August at the Duplex Studio.
Through a journey filled with classic songs crafted by the legendary musical duo Joseph Koo and James Wong, you will look back at Hong Kong from the 1970s to the 2000s and witness the rise of Cantopop and the transformation of the city.
Celebrating a musical partnership spanning three decades from 1972 to 2003, the exhibition sheds light on eight of the duo’s most beloved and memorable songs, in immersive settings and local decors filled with nostalgia, and digital displays revealing little-known stories behind the pair’s lyrics and compositions.
From commercial jingles to TV theme songs, chart-topping hits and internationally acclaimed film scores, the duo’s compositions touched the hearts of Hong Kongers and the wider Chinese diaspora, and became a reflection of the city’s remarkable transformations: evolution into a globally renowned metropolis, seismic technological advances in music production and dramatic changes in music consumption.
This sound journey begins in the “Calming Room”, a sonic decompression chamber where the titles of the 236 songs co-created by Koo and Wong come into view. From here, visitors can enter distinct spaces resonating with specific decades. Each space features items from the era, as well as screens showcasing lyrics and sheet music.
The space dedicated to the 1970s recreates a typical living room featuring a new television set. Melodies fill the air, like the song “If Loving You Means Hurting You” from the 1972 musical Pai Niang Niang, first-ever Chinese-language Broadway-style musical. Iconic theme songs from TV programmes like A House Is Not a Home and Below the Lion Rock will transport visitors through time. Moving on to the 1990s, a bedroom filled with late 20th-century nostalgia includes the song “Bonds of the Past” from the film A Better Tomorrow, evoking the burgeoning tension between traditional Chinese values and modern life.
The room “A Workplace Reimagined” represents a studio face-off between Koo and Wong, who rarely worked in the same room but communicated by phone and fax instead. The space is split between music and lyrics, representing the duo’s mostly virtual dynamic. This room also serves as a backdrop for Koo and Wong’s final collaboration, the captivating theme song for the stage musical Sweet & Sour Hong Kong (2003). To revive antiquated technology, visitors can pick up a landline and uncover commentaries in an introspective environment.
The lower level of the Duplex Studio is transformed into one of Hong Kong’s most distinctive culinary landscapes, a cha chaan teng, where vintage decor frames songs like “A Laugh at the World” from The Swordsman and the theme song from the 1980 TV drama The Bund. Alongside the cha chaan teng is a retro electric repair service where visitors can listen to “Fire Burns My Heart” from the 1989 film A Terra-Cotta Warrior. These two decor reconstruct daily ephemera of 1990s Hong Kong, and visitors will be surrounded by the media that defined the era: a neon-lit cassette tape installation reminiscing of the 1980s and a larger-than-life television set.
Alongside the show, Tai Kwun will also offer various activities, including workshops of song composition, arrangement and editing, as well as a series of Tai Kwun Conversations with music and TV experts, and film screenings related to Koo and Wong.
More details can be found here.