Sunny side up for singer Stefanie
Sunny side up for singer Stefanie
Clara Chow, The Straits Times/ANN
If music fans in Taiwan and Hong Kong understand why Singapore frowns on chewing gum and smoking, chances are they could have heard the reasons from homegrown singer Stefanie Sun.
On chat shows there, Singapore's most successful pop export to Asia often has to field questions about such issues.
"I try to be objective and point out the pros and cons -- that's why we feel safe at night and the streets are so clean," the petite 27-year-old tells Life! about how she responds, in an interview in Swissotel The Stamford hotel recently.
She was on a whirlwind visit home from Nov. 4 to promote her ninth album, A Perfect Day, and flew back to her current base in Taipei on Nov. 6.
Released last month, it has sold 10,000 copies here and 150,000 in Southeast Asia so far.
Sun sounds freer and edgier in her new work, something which has won praise from critics here. But some fans have been less than impressed, deeming it less catchy than her previous efforts.
On this, she says: "I always want to find a new angle in music, to life, to love.
"I didn't change my style deliberately. It was just how I was feeling during that phase."
She quotes the lyrics of one of the songs, Tears Forming A Poem: "My tears have been recycled and turned into rain. I've already treated your cruelty as a compliment."
Looking wistful, she philosophizes: "There are times when you feel a certain resentment once you're out of love. All you can do is blame the other person."
Press her on whether the lyrics reflect her love life and she checks herself.
"No, I've been ... okay," she says hesitantly. "There have been a few heartaches ... "
Then, she says firmly: "But not a convenient time to talk about this."
She reportedly shed silent tears when Taiwanese talk-show host Jacky Wu asked her about her romance with 31-year-old Singaporean accountant Dennis Foo on his program recently.
That prompted unconfirmed talk that her two-and-a-half-year relationship was in trouble.
But her record company, Warner Music, later told the press that the tears were a reaction to the trials of being an entertainer as her work schedule this year had prevented her from visiting her grandmother before the latter died.
Sullen teenager
One thing is for sure though -- marriage is not on the cards soon. The doting aunt to her elder sister's children -- an infant niece and a year-old nephew -- says she doesn't see herself as a mother just yet.
Born Sng Ee Tze to a lecturer father and teacher mother, she grew up the middle child. Her two sisters are a 30-year-old who works in the banking sector and a 21-year-old medical student at the National University of Singapore.
A self-confessed "awkward kid", she went to Raffles Girls' Secondary School and St Andrew's Junior College.
"I felt that I never really fit in. I used to be sullen and would stay in my room thinking about a lot of things, although I can't remember what now."
She admits that she would probably have made a good advertising executive if she had gone down that path after graduating with a business degree from the Nanyang Technological University in 1999.
"Both advertising and being a singer is about understanding human behavior," she says.
But, mentored by Singaporean singer-songwriter-producer Paul Lee Wai Shiong, she hit it big in Taiwan in May 2000 with her debut album I Am Stefanie Sun.
Altogether, she has sold more than 3.1 million copies of her eight albums, including a compilation CD and an English-language covers project.
Even a year-long hiatus in 2003 did not cause a dent in her popularity. A comeback album, Stefanie, released last November, sold 100,000 copies in Asia, and 25,000 here in a month.
In September, she held two concerts at the Hong Kong Coliseum with tickets selling out in three hours.
And at the 12th Singapore Hit Awards at Suntec City recently, she won four awards, including Best Performing Regional Female Artiste and Song Of The Year (for Same Kind).
Sun exposure
Such triumphs keep her in the news.
Asked if she saw her recent publicity stunt of spending 24 hours in a glass house outside Taipei 101, the world's tallest building, to promote her new album as a metaphor for her life in showbiz, she agrees.
"In Taiwan, the paparazzi would camp outside my house. But I'm not a very wild person. I'm sure they are very confused sometimes as to whether they should follow me or not."
It is only back home, where she has bought a Bukit Timah landed property and lives with her retired parents and sisters, that she enjoys a certain degree of anonymity and privacy.
Is it because Singaporeans are not proud about their own musical successes? Sun flashes a knowing smile and says: "It's getting a lot better. But it took some time.
"Initially, you could feel the skepticism, like 'Aw, really? Who is she?' But after I won some awards, people started to recognize me. It's such a pity it has to be this way because we have good musicians here."
Not that she is now completely free of detractors, who are miffed perhaps by her seemingly smooth ascendancy to pop stardom.
But music-industry insiders here feel that she is maintaining her position as pop princess well.
Lim Sek, chief executive of entertainment company Music & Movement, observes: "Although there are changes here and there, she is always going in the right direction -- staying within pop, which is what she does best."
He adds: "She has got a sunshine disposition and it's reflected in her songs. And she's always open to new styles and making them her own."
Songwriter Eric Ng, who has worked with Sun on her past two albums, pins her appeal down to her voice and girl-next-door image.
"She's got a unique tone -- not technically perfect, but the right mixture of prowess and emotion. She doesn't put on airs, and that's important for the success of any artiste."
Many of her fans agree. Designer Wu Yen Yen, 28, says: "It sounds cheesy, but when I think of her, it feels like home."
Danny Yeo, a former DJ and now media studies lecturer at Ngee Ann Polytechnic, notes: "She is more confident now and also has the bargaining power to explore beyond commercial genres. From her third album on, she has been slipping in more alternative songs into her albums."
So what does Sun make of her lofty position and standing with industry folks and fans?
Maybe she's a wiser pro now because she says matter-of-factly: "I never want to measure these things. Like, look, I sold how many copies of my album.
"It's just doing a job. When I finish it, it's in the past."
You ask her what she would want to be doing when she turns 30, 40 and 50. She thinks long and hard before replying: "By 30, maybe I'll have the impulse to get married.
"By 40, I'll be very comfortable. The Desperate Housewives are in their 40s, right? I'll probably be like them, going for Botox. "And by 50, dunno lah. But I must age gracefully. Like my mother."