Music of the People’s Republic of China Era 1949 -1990s

The golden age of the shidaiqu and the seven great singer stars that came to an end when the Communist party denounced the Chinese famous music as yellow music (pornography), Maoists considered pop music as a failure to the art form in mainland China. In the year 1949, the Kuomintang moved to Taiwan, and the People Republic of China was created. The revolutionary songs would become heavily promoted by the state, the Maoists, during the Cultural Revolution, pushed the revolutionary music as the only acceptable kind; because of the propaganda, this genre largely overshadowed all others and came to almost define the mainland Chinese music. It is still, in some form, an on-going process but some students and musician (Chinese and otherwise) are trying to recover old music.

source of picture: lucian.uchicago.edu

The pop music in mainland China was recovered after the marketing reform by Deng Xiao Ping, now the music of China differ as a combination of pop and classical music. Just like in main recent countries, China has a fast production of different kinds of new music, while the old music is also kept alive.

After the Tiananmen Square protest of 1989, a recent fast tempo Northwest wind pattern that is launched by the people to counter the government, the music would progress into Chinese rock, and remained famous in the 1990s. While the music in China is very much state-owned as the Television, media, and major show hall are all managed by the Communist party. The government mainly pick not to support Chinese rock by limiting its exposure and airtime; as a result, the kind never reached the mainstream in its entirety.