Zhang Lu (

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

: 張露; January 21, 1932 – January 26, 2009), often written Chang Loo, was a Chinese singer and actress, known as a pioneer in Chinese pop beginning in the 1940s.

Biography

She was born Zhang Xiuying (张秀英) in Suzhou in 1932. Her family moved to

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

when she was a young child. Zhang was discovered in the mid-1940s by her neighbor, a broadcaster, who recommended her to sing at a local radio station. She started out singing covers of popular Zhou Xuan songs. By the late 1940s, she had signed with

EMI EMI Group Limited (originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records Ltd. or simply EMI) was a British Transnational corporation, transnational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in March 1 ...

. She released a series of hits songs, becoming popular in both Shanghai and

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

. "给我一个吻" ("Give Me a Kiss"), a Mandarin cover of "

Seven Lonely Days "Seven Lonely Days" is a song written by Earl Shuman, Alden Shuman, and Marshall Brown. It was originally recorded by American singer Georgia Gibbs with orchestra conducted by Glenn Osser and the Yale Bros. choir in December 1952 and released in ...

," became one of her best-known songs. Other hits included "小小羊儿要回家," "不许他回家," and "迎春花" ("Little Lamb is Going Home," "Don't Let Him Go Home," and "Winter Jasmine," respectively). She was considered a pioneer of

Chinese pop music C-pop is an abbreviation for Chinese popular music (), a loosely defined musical genre by artists originating from mainland China,Hong Kong and Taiwan (the Greater China region). This also includes countries where Chinese languages are used by ...

in this period, singing in both Chinese and English and incorporating

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

styles. Zhang also worked as an actress, including in the films ''Prisoner of Love'' in 1951 and ''The Lark'' in 1965. In 1952, she moved to Hong Kong. She married the Filipino musician Ollie Delfino, whom she had met while performing in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

, in the late 1950s. The couple had two sons, Orlando and

Alex To Alex To (born Alejandro Delfino on 10 February 1962) is a Hong Kong- and Taiwan-based singer and actor. He is the winner of the 4th annual New Talent Singing Awards in 1985. He has released numerous albums throughout his career and mainly has ...

. Zhang retired in 1975 and moved to Canada in the following decade. She returned to Hong Kong when her son Alex became a successful performer, and she occasionally returned to the public eye to perform with him. She died in Hong Kong in 2009, at age 76. Her music saw a revival in popularity in 2003, when her songs "All the Stars in the Sky" and "The Plough Song" were remixed for the compilation ''The Original Shanghai Divas''. In 2019, her song "Tiao Yi Ge Man Bo" appeared in Season 3 of the American show ''

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel ''The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel'' is an American period comedy-drama television series, created by Amy Sherman-Palladino, that premiered on March 17, 2017, on Amazon Prime Video. Set in the late 1950s and early 1960s, it stars Rachel Brosnahan as ...

''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zhang, Lu 1932 births 2009 deaths Chinese women singers 20th-century Chinese actresses Chinese pop singers People from Suzhou Chinese emigrants to Hong Kong Chinese Civil War refugees Pathé Records (China) artists Pathé Records (Hong Kong) artists