Hong Kong-born musical treasure Anthony Lun gave new blood to the local music scene in the 1990s. While best remembered for his collaborations with Sandy Lam and Anita Mui, he’s back on stage now with local comedian Jim Sui-man. He tells Victor Chau about working with Hong Kong’s divas and talks about his own music.
I was initially a psychology major at the University of Michigan and was doing a minor in music when the teacher at the music academy encouraged me to give music a go. In my final year I had already started teaching music at my university.
I found teaching very repetitive. In the end I was laid off because the department had its funding cut. Then I began to establish myself as a lounge singer. Six months later I was already touring from bar to bar with performances of English-language golden oldies.
My musical career in Hong Kong didn't see an easy start. Although I was signed by one of the biggest record companies at that time, my record sales were awful – only 7,000 copies were sold for my first album. It was almost like career death. My second album, “Return All My Love,” was also a disaster. Being in the same company with Leslie Cheung, Anita Mui and Roman Tam obviously didn’t help.
I started to realize that my style – R&B and Motown – wasn’t suitable to Hong Kong. I knew I had to change.
My next step was to further my musical studies by learning how to compose and edit music. Michael Lai Siu-tin soon gave me a chance to make music for Anita Mui – my songs all hit No.1 on all the charts in Hong Kong.