Reputed as the current king of Chinese songsters, Jay Chou has exerted a great influence on the country's younger generation. Indeed, his first five albums have all been huge hits, so needless to say, his latest work attracted great attention upon its release this month. Entitled November's Chopin, this new 12-song collection has come out a few months after the traditional summer-release period, presumably because dark November is closer in spirit to Chopin than the sunny months of July and August.

Beginning with a vocal style pitched much higher than on previous works, this new song, Hair Like Snow, from Jay Chou sounds somewhat oriental, while combining his usual blend of traditional instrumentation and rap.

The title of Jay's new album, "November's Chopin", was an interesting choice, but not completely without logic. Although Jay is hardly as talented as Chopin, the Taiwan superstar is a big admirer of this Polish pianist and composer, while many of the album's tracks are piano-based. In fact, here's Nocturne, a good example of this piano-bias, and also the best known track on this new release.

This piece Nocturne is a beautiful, sentimental song laced with lonely echoes of classical guitar and piano, while Jay whispers rather than raps over the top. Once released, this opening album track released waves of interest throughout the Chinese public.

With the conclusion of Nocturne, here comes another quite different piece, with the peculiar title "romantic cell phone". This song's somewhat odd melody highlights an obvious fact of modern life, that millions of couples exchange text messages and mobile pictures to express their love. On an album full of excellent songs, some may say that this is the most modest tune, but don't be surprised if "Romantic Cell-phone" becomes a favorite with the ladies.

With Jay's 12 new songs woven together into a distinct whole, "November's Chopin" is almost a concept album, with its autumnal theme and contemplative mood. We'll play you an unconnected bonus track, "all the way north", a song originally taken from the hit Hong Kong movie Initial D, which is directed by Andrew Lau and stars Jay Chou. So if you want a better idea of Jay's new album, and you live in China, it's easily available at any local record store, although a tad expensive at just over 30RMB.

(CRI.com November 29, 2005)