For the past 14 months, Hong Kong-born singer Eric Suen Yiu-wai has been kept out of his home arena because of contractual problems. However, with that sorted out, a new record deal and a new Cantonese album of new-plus-old hits out, Hits Sixteen released last month, Suen is fighting fit and raring to get back in the ring.
And, it probably reflects on his album cover which shows him in various pugilistic poses. Suen laughs self-consciously when this is mentioned, even though it is obvious that he is fit and trim from regular workouts.
'Well, the image director [Joey Chu] initially thought like everyone else: that I should wear nice clothes, and look handsome and nice. Then he saw that I was also very active and energetic, and he felt that was the side of me that would be better portrayed,' Suen said.
Although he has not been able to do much singing work in Hong Kong in the past year, the singer has been very active in Taiwan where he first launched his career in 1993. Besides releasing a Mandarin album, Surely , and an English album, he also represented Taiwan in the Asian Music Festival in Japan and made his first Taiwanese movie.
But most special to Suen is the 2.5 months' 'holiday' his recording and management company gave him to go to the United States. Suen spent October to December of 1996 in Los Angeles, where he recorded an English album and also took singing lessons under Jodi Sellards, who has taught stars such as Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder.
'I had never taken singing lessons before. I mean, I had the basic ability to sing but I never had the chance to take lessons,' said the singer, who was plucked from the Chinese University by Taiwanese recording company, Golden Point, even before he graduated.
'But in the past, I had the chance to do some of the recording for my albums in the US and got to know some musicians who introduced me to Jodi. I was very happy when she took me on as a pupil because she doesn't teach everyone who approaches her. I guess it is affinity. We got along quite well when we met the first few times.' Besides singing, Suen also signed up for dancing lessons, joining a class where the students were mainly black and had a natural feel for rhythm. Initially, he found it difficult to keep up with them but his classmates helped by giving him some pointers.