Ram Chiang’s Career from Singer to Actor
TVB drama Finding Her Voice <牛下女高音> is receiving positive feedback for a plot featuring a group of middle-aged men rediscovering their passion and starting a music group. A member of the music group, Ram Chiang’s (蔣志光) character gets to show off his singing skills. Off-screen, Ram is also a talented singer-composer and his hit song “Strangers When We Meet“ <相逢何必曾相識> is considered to be a Chinese pop classic. Having experienced both singing and acting, Ram spoke about his choices in his career path.
Composing His Songs
Reaching commercial success in the 1990, many people today still listen to Ram’s hit song. Recalling the composition process, Ram revealed, “The song, ‘Strangers When We Meet,’ was the last song in my personal album. Karaoke was very popular back then. Since there weren’t many duet songs in the market, I thought there was a good chance that the song will sell well. The song was composed while calculating the market.”
Though the song topped the charts, Ram soon discovered he lost inspiration. “The song was popular, and it won a prize. What’s next? What can I do next?”
Unable to answer his questions, Ram decided to quit his career in music. “You can’t repeat composition and I won’t be satisfied. When I couldn’t get any new ideas, I had to quit.”
Becoming an Actor
Although Ram stopped singing, he did not give up his passion for the entertainment industry, and decided to pursue acting instead. As a supporting actor in many series, Ram won the Best Supporting Actor in 2014 for his role in Come On, Cousin <老表, 你好 hea!> where Ram had the opportunity to showcase his composition skills. Ram rewrote the lyrics to his hit song to fit a scene and the new song went viral.
In Ram’s many years of being a supporting actor, he carried himself as a professional, “An important supporting role is more important than the main character and it is less work too. Besides, having your own creation is more important than being a main character.”
Source: hket
This article is written by Sammi for JayneStars.com.
Though he’s content as supporting role, it would’ve been nice to see him as lead like a role reversal with Hugo. Change it up, yk?
He’ll forever know as Ah Fo-ok from Kindred Spirit for me 🙂
@jjwong LOL…Yup, agreed! 🙂
I guess because I grew up in the 80s and was a huge HK music fan back then, Ram was actually known to me as a singer/songwriter first, with the acting part coming later. With his music talent, I always thought it was a shame that he left the music scene so early…not only that, it was one of those situations where everyone thought he had abandoned his music career forever, seeing how in the subsequent 25 years or so, he pretty much refused to do anything music-related (which made those rare moments in his TV series where he would actually open his mouth to sing – like in Kindred Spirit for example – all the more memorable). When I heard him and Rita perform the “Strangers” song back during Come On, Cousin (which, of course, Ram was the one main thing that made that series worth watching), I nearly cried (brought back so many memories of 80s/early 90s HK music industry). In any case, I’m glad he’s gotten back into music now….his acting is still awesome of course, but I miss his singing, plus having songwriting talent is hard to come by nowadays, so I hope he does more of that too….
@llwy12 Ha, it’s opposite for me. I saw him on Kindred Spirit first, then heard his singing via an old award show that my dad just so happened to watch. Then dad told me all about how popular the song and how good Ram voice is.
What other songs have he written? I wonder why he doesn’t open a teaching studio. I heard a radio segment where he distinguished tones, voices, and stuff. He’s just awesome all around !
i love his acting and his voice is incredible hope he continues to film