Coco Lee

QUICK FACTS

• born in Hong Kong
• family lived in San Fransisco for a while
• while visiting Hong Kong with her sisters at the age of 17, she sang a Whitney Houston song at a talent contest hosted by Hong Kong channel TVB and received an offer
• has since released too many albums to count, including Coco Lee (1996) and Exposed (2005) (English)
• sang the Mandarin versions of "Colors of the Wind" and "Reflection" and did the Mandarin dub for Disney's Mulan (1998)
• has done duets with Jacky Cheung, Van Ness Wu, and non-Chinese singers including Kelly Price and Julio Iglesias
• was friends with Michael Jackson
• performed at the 73rd Academy Awards
• sang a song for the Beijing Olympics, "Forever Friends"
• is a YouthAIDS Ambasssador in Thailand
• married to president of trading group Li & Fung, Canadian Bruce Philip Rockowitz
• recently projects include a song for the Shanghai Expo and the second leg of her East2West World Tour

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Coco Lee has had a remarkable number of firsts as an Asian pop singer in the international music scene. A whole ten years after her crossover debut, she has been listed by E! Entertainment as one of the world's 25 sexiest divas ahead of Fergie, Madonna, and J. Lo.

Baccarat Hong Kong, June 2009

While she spent her younger years in Hong Kong, at age ten, she and her two older sisters relocated to the US with their mother, who was going to med school in California.
Young Coco totally loved listening to Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey. It was after high school that she returned to Hong Kong and entered the talent contest through which she was discovered.

Here is what Coco has said about her upbringing:

"Growing up outside of China, in the US, I took in a lot of art and ways of thinking, and it has made me bolder...I've always been Chinese, and you can be born American, you know, an American-born Chinese, but in the States people will still see you as Chinese. And so I always hold onto that, my roots as Chinese, and my mom raised us in a very traditional way, and so we were brought up very, very Chinese."

From her first album in 1994 up to 1999, she had released 15 albums and reached some serious stardom in Greater China before returning to the US with her English-language debut, Just No Other Way, right at the peak of the American 90s pop era. Unfortunately it wasn't the big breakthrough that was hoped for and did not establish Coco as a lasting presence in American pop.

Christine Chiao of UCLA Asia Institute analyzes Coco's "incomplete crossover," naming factors that include "the American mainstream media's inadecuacy with grappling biculturality," the "lack of a central narrative in her marking strategy," the lack of the American public's familiarity with & understanding of Asian culture, and the style (R&B-hip-hop infused pop that was not popular at the time) and quality of the music (not her best songs) that she chose to release in English.

Despite this disappointment, the album's first single, "Before I Fall In Love," was featured on the soundtrack of the popular romantic comedy Runaway Bride starring Julia Roberts, while funky "Do You Want My Love" was pretty successful on the Billboard chart:



That was the same year that Coco dueted with Julio Iglesias (father of "Bailamos" Enrique) and the following year performed with Ricky Martin on the Taiwan part of his Asia tour. I mention this part because I really love Ricky.

2001 was a big year when she sang both the Mandarin and English versions of "A Love Before Time," the theme of the blockbuster Ang Lee film, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. She became the first Chinese singer to perform at the Academy Awards and also at an NBA (Houston Rockets) game in 2002, the year that Yao Ming was drafted.



Check out her performance at the Oscars here:



In 2002 she participated in a charity song for SARS (co-written by our Leehomie!) with various Asian stars. Her second English album, Exposed, did not get released in the US but was banned in the HK and Mainland for its not-rated-G content (this was not the only time that this has happened, however) and included a hot collaboration with an Indian rapper.

For Beijing she sang a unifying bilingual song with Mainland star Sun Nan.


Too cute.

The Olympics among other smaller events were a break in her three-year hiatus as she transitioned from Sony to the Warner Music label. She took some time off to travel and listen to new music, spend time with family, and marry her then-fiance, Bruce Rockowitz.


Coco with Bruce and his daughters

Coco definitely knows how to show her love for her American fans:


Many of her tours have had stops in the US, including the one for her latest album, a fusion pop effort called East to West (2009) that spent two years in production. Coco upholds her bold & sexy persona that she calls the "Western" side of her.



In 2010 she has sung "Smile Shanghai" for the Expo along with Andy Lau, Jane Zhang, Jam Hsiao, and JJ Lin. She also continues her East to West Tour.



Overall, Coco Lee has definitely reached considerable worldwide fame as an Asian popstar. She has made a lot of effort in this area because it's something that she really believes in. Of her crossover in 2000, she says

"It was one of the toughest challenges of my life...I'm so lucky to have gone so far, and I just hope to open doors for many other Asians. For me I'm just proud, I'm so proud when I can see Lang Lang perform at the Oscars or the Grammy's, that was a huge thing. I think that if we all stand together, we can be a very powerful force, so I always feel that the Asian market needs to be stronger."

Her advice for Asian artists looking to crossover is this: "It's all about showcasing your talent to the West, and as long as you have confidence and believe in yourself and you've got the talent, people are going to believe in you as well."

[Source: TheStarOnline interview]



I really appreciate Coco's optimistic outlook. Maybe she can try crossing over again now that hip-hop and R&B-influenced is on American radio all the time. She can arrange a duet with Lil Wayne even though he's kind of gross, because that is how all the hits get made. BABY ARE YOU DOWN? (Connection: Coco covered Jay Sean's "Maybe" on East to West. Check it out.)

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