David Tao

David Tao
Chinese name 陶喆
Pinyin Táo Zhé (Mandarin)
Birth name Táo Xùzhōng (陶緒忠)
Origin Republic of China (Taiwan)
Born (1969-07-11) July 11, 1969
Hong Kong
Occupation Singer-songwriter
Genre(s) Rock, Mandopop, R&B, hard rock
Label(s) Shok Records (1997–2004)
EMI Music Taiwan (2005–2007)
Gold Typhoon (2007–2009)
Years active 1997–present
Parents Tao Dawei, Wang Furong
Influenced Tension
Official website www.davidtao.com
This is a Chinese name; the family name is Tao.

David Tao (Chinese: 陶喆; pinyin: Táo Zhé), born Tao Xuzhong (Chinese: 陶緒忠) (born 11 July 1969), is a Taiwanese Golden Melody Award-winning singer-songwriter. He is well known for creating a crossover genre of R&B and hard rock tunes which has now become his signature style and for having popularized R&B in the Mandopop industry.

Biography

Tao was born on 11 July 1969 in Hong Kong to parents who were entertainers in Taiwan. His father, Tao Dawei (David Tao Sr.) (28 September 1942 - 12 September 2012),[1] was an actor/singer/composer/TV Host and his mother, Wang Furong (Catherine), a Chinese opera singer.

Tao spent part of his childhood in Hong Kong (something which he shared with his audience during his Soul Power concerts in Hong Kong). His parents supposedly eloped when his father could not get approval to marry his mother. Tao had his education in Taiwan from kindergarten to the junior high school level at the Bethany Campus of Morrison Academy in Taipei. Later, his father decided to pursue his dream of working for Walt Disney, and they moved to the United States city of Arcadia, California. There he attended Arcadia High School. where David Tao Sr. realized his dream and worked as an animator in Disney Burbank.

Tao's parents later returned to Taiwan where his father began his singing career, leaving him to complete his education in the United States. Left to fend for himself, Tao took on many jobs, including a stint as a policeman in the LAPD, without the knowledge of his parents. Eventually, he graduated with a bachelor's degree in Psychology from UCLA.

Career

Whilst working as a salesman, Tao was offered a job by Taiwanese producer Wang Chih-ping and went back to Taiwan, initially writing, and later producing songs for many singers before releasing his self-titled album David Tao in 1997. He has since released four more albums, a live concert recording and a compilation of his best songs. His works have influenced many singers to acknowledge his works more than the normal listener. Tao is a prolific composer and songwriter and has written songs for fellow artists such as A-Mei and S.H.E..

David Tao (1997)

In 1997, with the help of Wang and another Taiwanese producer, Jim Lee, Tao released his self-titled first album (David Tao), under an independent label called Shock Records, set up by Taiwanese pop singer Jin Ruei-yao, and her husband. This album set a record in Taiwan during the 9th Golden Melody Awards, as the first album from a new singer ever, to be nominated for a total of 5 awards - Best Newcomer, Best Singer, Best Producer, Best Song and Best Album.

Airport 10.30 first caught people's attention, but it was the simply arranged, melodic I Love You that became one of Tao's signature tunes. The album also featured an a cappella song, Spring Wind, which was a new R&B version of a favorite old Taiwanese song. Tao sang all the vocals in this song, which still stands today, widely regarded as one of the best a cappella songs in Chinese.

Airport 10.30 was also nominated for the MTV Awards for Best Chinese Video in 1998 along with Coco Lee, who became the eventual winner.

Tao won two of the awards, namely Best Newcomer and Best Producer, becoming the first newcomer/singer to also win a Best Producer award. Tao's first album was notable for the excellent production which, remarkably, was done in Tao's home in Los Angeles entirely. The album also broke new ground in the music style and arrangement with its strong Western-influenced R&B flavor.

Tao shot to an unprecedented meteoric rise to fame following the release of David Tao. Unable to cope with the sudden media attention, he flew back to Los Angeles soon afterwards.

Between David Tao and his next album, besides releasing a remixed Bastard Pop ep, writing and producing songs for various hit Taiwanese singers, notably a theme song which became one of Taiwanese boyband Tension's hit songs, I'll Be With You, Tao was not heard on the Mandarin-Pop scene for a long while as he quietly disappeared into obscurity.

I'm OK (1999)

In 1999, two years after his first album, Tao released his second album I'm OK. This album was claimed to be a best-selling album by breaking the previous record by selling 600,000 copies, yet various critics had claimed that the impact of I'm OK was not any stronger than his previous work in terms of style and arrangement.

Notable hits include:

In this album, Tao attempted many musical styles, including, unsurprisingly, his favorite rock music. In fact, some critics have noted that each of his songs are different from one another, in terms of their style and music arrangement.

Tao was nominated for six GMA awards for I'm OK - Best Album, Best Producer, Best Singer, Best Video, Best Song and Best Song Arrangement. He only won the Best Producer Award on the GMA, but Rain later went on to win Best Chinese Video at the 2000 MTV Music Awards.

Black Tangerine (2002)

In 2002, Tao released "Black Tangerine". Some notable songs in this post-911 album, of which he derived much of his inspiration from:

What set Black Tangerine apart was the strong social commentary, including a track consisting of various actual Taiwanese news snippets of unrelated family tragedies and public incidents, placing the state of Taiwanese society in a somewhat negative point of view.

Dear God tells about the sadness of Tao regarding a mother of a victim who has died in 911 and stared at her son’s picture and expected him to revive. Tao uses his song as weapon to bitterly criticize terrorists. Also, this song expressed Tao’s voice that love was gradually neglected by this society; more and more people concern about money and drama more than love and equality today. Melody was written for his ex-girlfriend whose name is Melody. Tao and melody were in a relationship when Tao was 16 years old. This song was an important memory to Tao.

Black Tangerine won various awards in Asia but was, incidentally, overlooked for the Golden Melody Awards in Taiwan, where the album was originally intended for.

Tao has since held a series of successful concerts in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore in 2003, having already won many fans over with his signature simplistic style.

The Great Leap (2005)

In 2005, Tao released his fourth album, The Great Leap. It earned four nominations at 17th Golden Melody Awards and won the "Best Album Award". Notable songs in the album include:

The Great Leap album cover

Beautiful (2006)

A fifth studio album by Tao was released on 4 August 2006. "Beautiful" was a successful album which had three nominations in GMA, being nominated with Best Song, Best Composer and Best Male Vocalist.Despite Tao being a GMA veteran, he never won Best vocalist and this time this was also no exception with Tao only winning Best Song with his Marry Me Today. Among the more popular songs in the album are the title song Too beautiful, another old song restyled into Tao's signature arrangement, Can't Get You Outta My Mind, and a duet song with Jolin Tsai, Marry Me Today.

Opus 69 (2009)

Tao's sixth album was released on August 21, 2009. It marks the return of Tao, and he developed the album with a blend of R&B, Rock and Soft Ballads.

Hello Goodbye (2013)

Four years after Opus 69, David Tao finally returns with the new album Hello Goodbye. The album was released on June 11, 2013. In this album, he integrated musical elements of yesterday – like classical guitar, synthesizer and harmonica – into contemporary melodies and arrangements. David teamed up with fellow singer-songwriters Tanya Chua and Crowd Lu as well as Sharon Kwan on multiple songs. Other than working with longtime collaborators waa and Ge Da Wei, he also invited Lin Xi, Huang Ting and Wu Hsiung to pen lyrics for the album.[2]

Personal life

Tao married Penny Chiang on August 31, 2014.[3] On June 29, 2015, talent agent Yang Ziqing revealed that she had an affair with Tao, for which he publicly apologized on July 7.[4] Tao and Yang had known each other since 2010, and had briefly dated before Tao's marriage to Chiang.[5] In 2011, it was reported by multiple Asian media outlets that Tao was to marry model Jian Baoshan that January, which he denied.[6][7]

Discography

Studio albums
# English Title Chinese Title Release Date Label
1st David Tao 陶喆 同名專輯 6 December 1997 Shok Records
2nd I'm OK 10 December 1999 Shok Records
3rd Black Tangerine 黑色柳丁 9 August 2002 Shok Records
4th The Great Leap 太平盛世 21 January 2005 EMI Music Taiwan
5th Beautiful 太美麗 4 August 2006 EMI Music Taiwan
6th Opus 69 69樂章 21 August 2009 Gold Typhoon
7th Hello Goodbye 再見你好嗎 11 June 2013 Gold Typhoon
Compilation albums
# English Title Chinese Title Release Date Label
1st Ultrasound 1997–2003 樂之路 8 August 2003 EMI Music Taiwan
Soundtrack albums
# English Title Chinese Title Released Date Label
1st Adoration 暗戀 LIVE特別版 15 September 2009 Gold Typhoon
Concert DVD/Live Album
# English Title Chinese Title Released Date Label
1st Ultrasound (the documentary film) 十一號產房 11 July 2003 Shok Records
2nd Soul Power Live album 陶喆現場原音專輯 20 December 2003 Shok Records
3rd Soul Power Live @ Hong Kong 陶喆香港演唱會實況 17 February 2004 Shok Records
4th David Tao Live 2009 (Shanghai) 1.2.3我們都是木頭人 陶喆 世界巡迴演唱會 (上海站) 27 March 2009 Gold Typhoon

Awards

Golden Melody Awards
Year Number Award Nomination Result Ref
1998 9th Best Mandarin Album David Tao Nominated [8][9]
Best Composer "沙灘" (Blue Moon) Nominated
Best Album Producer David Tao Won
Best Male Mandarin Artist David Tao Nominated
Best New Artist David Tao Won
2000 11th Best Mandarin Album I'm OK Nominated [10][11]
Best Music Video "找自己" (Rain) Nominated
Best Composer "找自己" (Rain) Nominated
Best Arrangement "找自己" (Rain) Nominated
Best Album Producer I'm OK Won
Best Male Mandarin Artist David Tao Nominated
2006 17th Best Mandarin Album The Great Leap Won [12]
2007 18th Best Song of the Year "今天妳要嫁給我" (Marry Me Today) feat. Jolin Tsai from Beautiful Won [13][14]
Best Composer David Tao for "今天妳要嫁給我" (Marry Me Today) from Beautiful Nominated
Best Male Mandarin Artist David Tao for Beautiful Nominated
2010 21st Best Male Mandarin Artist David Tao Won [15]
HITO Radio Music Awards
Year Category Nomination Result Ref
2007 Best Producer David Tao Won [16]
Best Composer "似曾相識" (Finally) Won
Best Loved by Audience "今天妳要嫁給我" (Marry Me Today) Won
Top 10 Songs of the Year Won

References

  1. ↑ David Tao Sr. passed away from cancer, David Jr.'s agent confirms (Chinese)
  2. ↑ http://www.yesasia.com/us/1033394627-0-0-0-en/info.html
  3. ↑ "Mandopop's biggest stars attend David Tao's wedding banquet". AsiaOne. 2 September 2014. Retrieved 10 July 2015.
  4. ↑ "Singer David Tao admits cheating on his wife in Chengdu last month". Straits Times. 7 July 2015. Retrieved 10 July 2015.
  5. ↑ Cheng, Sabine; Chen, Christie (7 July 2015). "Singer David Tao apologizes for extramarital affair". Retrieved 10 July 2015.
  6. ↑ Cheong Poh Kwan (30 December 2010). "David Tao's a Singapore homeowner". AsiaOne. Retrieved 10 July 2015.
  7. ↑ Loh, Adeline (4 January 2011). "David Tao’s cinematic dreams". UrbanWire. Retrieved 10 July 2015.
  8. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 9th Golden Melody Awards nominees list 3 January 1998. Retrieved 2011-03-06
  9. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 9th Golden Melody Awards winners list 3 January 1998. Retrieved 2011-03-06
  10. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 11th Golden Melody Awards nominees list 27 April 2004. Retrieved 2011-03-06
  11. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 11th Golden Melody Awards winners list 27 April 2004. Retrieved 2011-03-06
  12. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 17th Golden Melody Awards winners list Retrieved 2011-03-06
  13. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 18th Golden Melody Awards nomination list 4 June 2007. Retrieved 2011-04-24
  14. ↑ (Chinese) GIO, Taiwan 18th Golden Melody Awards winners list 16 June 2007. Retrieved 2011-04-20
  15. ↑ Winners of Taiwan’s 21st Golden Melody Awards Retrieved 2011-03-06
  16. ↑ (Chinese) HITO Radio 2007 HITO Radio Music Awards winners list 4 February 2007. Retrieved 2011-04-20

External links

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