TAIWANESE
WAVES
AUG
/03
5pm Doors | 6pm Show
Rumsey Playfield, Central Park, NYC
Enno Cheng is a singer-songwriter, actress, and writer whose four albums — Neptune, Pluto, Dear Uranus, and Mercury Retrograde — span from her 2007 debut to today. She has been part of Taiwanese indie bands Chocolate Tiger and Felix Felicia, and her 2022 solo concert at Taipei Music Center sold out to a 5,000 audience.
Mercury Retrograde, Enno’s first all-Taiwanese album, is produced by Chunho and fuses electronic, rock, and folk into an innovative Taiwanese Hokkien sound that won Best Taiwanese Album and Best Taiwanese Female Singer at the 34th Golden Melody Awards. Her 2023 solo tour spanned Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Korea, and Canada, where she shared the significance of language in music creation. She is currently working on her second all-Taiwanese album, set to release in 2025.
ABAO is a Taiwanese neo-soul and R&B singer of Paiwan indigenous descent. She first broke into the Chinese-speaking pop world in 2003 but gained mainstream recognition in 2020 for her album Kinkaian (Mother Tongue).
Sung mostly in her native Paiwan language, the album was nominated for eight Golden Melody awards and went on to win Best Album and Best Song, a remarkable feat for an indigenous work given the dominance of Mandopop. Kinkaian, which mixes soul, R&B, hip-hop and electronic music with traditional Paiwan folk music, was inspired by helping her grandmother record a traditional Paiwan album.
"Those songs are an inseparable part of me. Wherever I am — the city or wherever — I feel an unbreakable connection to them. By collecting and recording songs from across the island, I’m finding my way back home."
In 2015, ABAO formed Nanguaq, which began as a project to collect and record traditional indigenous folk songs from all over the island, including those of her Paiwan heritage. Nanguaq has now evolved into an organization and cultural brand devoted to supporting and nurturing talent in indigenous communities across Taiwan.
Nanguaq supported production for ABAO’s album Kinakaian, which broke new ground in Taiwanese indigenous music by winning Best Album and Best Song at the Golden Melody Awards. Nanguaq’s other productions include artist žž (2020) and N1 (2021), a compilation of recordings by the latest generation of indigenous musicians in Taiwan.
The Bulareyaung Dance Company was founded in 2015 in Taitung by indigenous choreographer Bulareyaung Pagarlava. Creation of dance pieces and dancer training are accomplished by working in the mountains and singing old chants by the waterside. Dancers develop unique body movements and vocabulary by delving into their indigenous heritage and culture through regular field trips.
Since its founding, the company has presented several productions, including La Song (2015), Qaciljay (2016), Colors (2016), Stay That Way (2017), Luna (2018), #Yes or No (2019), Not Afraid of the Sun and Rain (2021), Rustling, Whirring (2022), tiaen tiamen Episode 1 (2023), tiaen tiamen Episode 2 (2024). Stay That Way won the Taishin Performing Arts Award in 2017, and Luna won the coveted Taishin Arts Award Annual Grand Prize in 2018. It is the first performing troupe to be awarded for two consecutive years.
Chinatown Records is a homegrown community effort to celebrate the sonic tapestry of music, memory, & history that comes with inherited family collections. Homebased in NYC’s Manhattan Chinatown, DJ historian yiuyiu 瑶瑶 takes on her childhood name to care for & activate the Chinatown Records archive of over 30 record/CD/tape collections inherited from her family & neighbors.
yiuyiu 瑶瑶 has the most fun playing records of golden songs at senior centers, leading karaoke dance floors with families & neighbors on the streets of Chinatown, & heating up club nights – as a dancer & DJ – with all genres of Chinese dance music. Spanning across Chinatown block parties, sonic histories, living room listenings, and beyond, Chinatown Records 華埠錄音 is an ever-growing record of the people we love, who bring all this music to life with us.
