Ai-ai was born Chien Yue-o in Hsinchuang in Taipei County in 1919. Recalling her childhood, she says, "My bedroom window used to face the stage of Hsinchuang's Kuanti Temple." Ai-ai remembers lying on her windowsill, singing along with the Taiwanese operas being performed across the way. "I used to know the lyrics to all the operas."

While a student at the Hsinchuang Public School, Ai-ai often represented her school in singing competitions, earning the nickname "Black Cat" from Hsinchuang residents for her fashion sense and her vivacity.

A daughter's worth

When Ai-ai was 16, her nephew had a friend who was recruiting female singers for Po-you Records. The nephew remembered his pretty music-loving aunt and recommended that she try out. Ai-ai, who describes herself as someone who's not put off by a challenge, attended the tryout, and won the job with her range and poise. Not long after, Columbia Records, for whom Chun-chun had made popular "The Peach Blossom's Tears of Blood" and "Hoping for Love," bought her contract, and Ai-ai became the company's second star.

According to Ai-ai, "Singing was a great job in those days." She earned ¥60 a month from Columbia, and another ¥20 a month from two regular radio performances. This gave her a monthly income of ¥80 at a time when six catties (roughly 3 kg) of pork cost only ¥1 and one qian (about 3.7 grams) of gold sold for ¥3.6. In contrast, most civil servants earned about ¥18 a month, and even a township head made only ¥40 a month at most. Ai-ai's memories of her glory days are still sharp: "My salary had all of Hsinchuang talking; people would point to my mother and say, 'That woman's daughter is worth three sons.'"

Lucky in love

Working for Columbia, Ai-ai practiced and performed, and even went to Japan to record an album. But her typical day involved taking the bus to Taipei's North Gate, then walking to the Columbia offices, which were located across from Chungshan Hall, where the Olympic Bakery sits today. When she was free, she used to go shopping with Chun-chun at the Chu-yuan Department Store. For Ai-ai, a spirited girl who liked to dress smartly, style was important, and she frequently changed hers. She went from wearing bangs to wearing a cap and even to wearing glasses when that came into fashion.

On their days off, she and her coworkers would head to Tamsui to stroll the beaches and take in the sea air. She didn't know then that Chou Tien-wang, a lyricist who had started at Columbia on the same day she had, had fallen for her the first time he set eyes on her. In those more conservative times, record companies, fearing that having a boyfriend might negatively affect their female stars' public image, discouraged them from dating. As a result, though Ai-ai sang Chou's "Dreaming of Love by the Riverside," which ran: "The spring wind by the river is cold / And I'm so lonely. / I lift my head / And see the lucky couples. / Oh, how she treated me / How she lied to me! / How could it be this way? / Doesn't she know how I feel," she didn't realize that he had written the song for her.

In 1940, the war in the Pacific forced Columbia to close its doors in Taiwan. Free of the record company, Chou was finally able to propose to Ai-ai, and she willingly took up homemaking.

After Taiwan returned to Chinese rule, Ko-yue Records hired Chou to head up its lyrics department, and Chou began writing songs with Yang San-lang. Together the two of them produced more than 20 hits, including "Lonely Flower in Love," "Autumn Winds, Night Rains," "Thinking of Home" and "Taipei at Midnight." Their success continued until the 1970s, when the government began discouraging the use of Taiwanese lyrics in songs. At that time, the government began to require that record companies acquire the rights from songwriters before releasing their songs, forcing lyricists and composers to sell their copyrights to the record companies on the cheap. Over time, many Taiwanese songs were lost, and Taiwanese songwriters fell on hard times.

Ai-ai, on the other hand, had put her eye for fashion to good use. After giving up the stage for homemaking, she had started a business knitting sweaters to order, hiring a number of women immigrants from mainland China to do the work. She also built a successful business trading in imported luxury items. Ai-ai sighs, recalling: "Following Taiwan's return to Chinese rule, you could have starved to death trying to make a living in music. I became the breadwinner in the family." But, through all the highs and lows, Ai-ai has remained a broad-minded and vivacious spirit.

Ai-ai is now a grandmother several times over. She now lives with her youngest son in Chinshan, where those researching the history of Taiwanese popular music often drop in for a visit. The 83-year-old Ai-ai is still a lively talker who becomes righteously indignant when discussing the injustices of the past. She has kept her wits about her, and when speaking about Chou Tien-wang or the history of Taiwanese popular music, rattles off data like a computer. But perhaps that is to be expected, since the story of that music, properly told, is virtually inseparable from the story of her life.

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Ai-ai was a vivacious, fashionable and generous young woman. (courtesy of Cheng Heng-lung)

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Now an 83-year-old grandmother, Ai-ai paints a vivid picture of the old days of Taiwanese popular music. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)

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Ai-ai's recording of "Spring Night Dream" was a smash hit. (courtesy of Cheng Heng-lung)