Rita Chao, aka "Seow Mei-Mei", the A-G0-Go Queen of the 60s. Recorded her first EP with The Quests that included one of her greatest hits during that period, "Shake, Shake, Shake" or "Yeow, Yeow, Yeow" in Mandarin. Like Sakura, she sang in Mandarin, English and Japanese. Most of her recordings were accompanied by The Quests. "Sixteen Candles" was one of her most popular English songs.
2008/07/19
Rita Chao
Rita Chao, aka "Seow Mei-Mei", the A-G0-Go Queen of the 60s. Recorded her first EP with The Quests that included one of her greatest hits during that period, "Shake, Shake, Shake" or "Yeow, Yeow, Yeow" in Mandarin. Like Sakura, she sang in Mandarin, English and Japanese. Most of her recordings were accompanied by The Quests. "Sixteen Candles" was one of her most popular English songs.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
Of all the beautiful young lady singers who were accompanied by The Quests on their records in Singapore 1960's, Rita Chao is the one Quests girl I love the most.
Not that Rita Chao and I go back a long way. As a matter of fact, I only really heard her music for the very first time in 2003, and that was only after some intense persuasion from a good friend in Singapore. Truth be known, I was very closeminded at that time, wanting only to Recollect The Quests, The Trailers, The Crescendos, Naomi and The Boys, The Thunderbirds, The Cyclones, The Jets, and a few other Singapore singers and bands whom I remembered from my childhood days in Singapore in the early 60's. Rita Chao was definitely not on my radar at all.
Just listen to The Quests' accompaniment on Rita's records, my friend kept saying. So I finally did, and no kidding, those were The Quests playing so distinctly on those records. Although I still suspect to this day that some of the voices accompanying the lady singers were studio singers and not necessarily The Quests boys themselves!
Anyway, it was love at first hearing, and Rita Chao now occupies a very prominent place in my heart when it comes to Singapore 60's Pop Music.
I remember how I used to loop together a few selected Rita Chao songs on my CD player, and I would play these songs over and over again non-stop. Very soothing, very nice, what I would refer to as... Music Therapy by Rita Chao.
The six songs, in order,
1. Heartbreak Flower
2. He's Untrue
3. My Lonely Heart
4. I Know
5. Because Of You
6. Only Friends
Even to this day, whenever I should feel mentally and physically fatigued after a hard day's work, Rita Chao still has a great way of massaging all my stress away with her sweet voice.
She's the one Quests girl I hope and dream to meet face to face someday.
Hey Joe, Rita Chao's voice is quite unique and I must say that most of her songs are soothing to hear. Incidentally, she is a distance relative of ours and she have completely given up singing... I last heard she was with a church and have not met her since 1967.
just like to know how our singapore singers of 60s are doing,they are good singers of my age group at that time
hi . i m one of the crazy boy dream of rita . n first time i saw her in the singapore tv variety show omg . she is my dream girl for years .
sorry i just found yr blog recently that bring back all my beautiful memory . any news about rita.tks again for yr sharing. i still follow sakura news but lost rita , hope to hear from u
I married Rita Chao. OK not really. But in 1978 I met someone who looks like her, dresses like her, sounds like her, dances like her and smiles like her. So naturally I fell in love with her and married her. Would love to meet the real Rita and tell her that. :)
Post a Comment