For those of you do not know who is Jasmine 庭竹, she is a music artiste from Taiwan. At the age of 26, many others would have hit the peak of their careers with several album releases, however that wasn’t the case for Ting Chu, she only released her debut album; 雨聲 in 2007. She isn’t like your average artiste you see ever so frequently in the industry. She isn’t just a singer, but a composer and musician as well.

Her talents extend beyond singing and writing songs, she also plays the piano, keyboard and guitar. If you have actually seen her performing 小女人 live, you would have noticed that she is without a band backing her up and she creates her own music through looping. What she actually does is to create samples of sounds which would be repeated throughout her performance and topping it up with the playing of a guitar while singing. This is a very unique kind of performance which is rarely seen in the Chinese music industry - an indication of how immensely talented Ting Chu is.

What I admire most about Ting Chu is the road taken by her to get to where she is right now. Through hard work and determination, performing at coffee shops and bars before finally being noticed and subsequently getting a contract with her current recording company; HummingBird music.

She does not have the ideal media friendly look like Jolin Tsai, Rainie Yang or Angela Chang, whatever recognition she has gained throughout this past year, it is solely based on what she has achieved with her music. It just irks me that musically talented artistes with a not so media appealing appearance are not given the recognition they deserve. Instead artistes with mediocre vocals are topping the charts week in week out, just because of factors not pertaining to their musical contribution. But then again, this is how showbiz works. If you have the face for it, you are at the top.

I am expecting a new album from her soon as demos of 2 of her songs; 幸福的翅膀 and 變調 have already been released as well as a duet she sang with Chris Bratten.