Last year I was in charge of producing 4 songs for Yumiko’s mandarine album. 2 out of 4 songs are reused from the previous album, “Super Model” in 2007. So basically I need to look for two more new songs for the new project. I spent a few days making my new electro dance track,”Not my Cup of Tea”. And I choose another one song out of 100 demos submitted by miscellaneous international music publishers. After a long search listening to the demos, we have got a few songs left on the table, and the record company finally picked the final winner, which is a cover song from Israel.
“In The Heat of Tel Aviv” is a fast dance track originally sung by Sarit Hadad in Hebrew language. This track started with a slow tempo intro accompanied with some ethic instruments, then transformed into a 4 on the 4 type of dance track which I really like. ( Trance Music is one of my music roots. Yes, Electronic music is always the best! ) The vocal parts is somehow melancholic but in an aggressive high temper way. Since most of the demos I have got are the typical R & B dance tunes, this trancy hebrew song stood up from the crowd naturally.
In order to keep the essence of the mysterious mood, we decided to retain the style of the original arrangement. I did the music programming in LOGIC and gave the lyricist some directions. We then spent 2 days in the studio recording with Yumiko. The intro part is basically a ballad, and then becoming wild and aggressive after the beats kick in.
Due to the nature of the voice of Yumiko is kind of bassy and thick, we were a little bit worry about if she can handle such a dynamic vocal singing style. After hours of trail and errors, Yumiko’s voice was extremely exhausted due to long hours of screaming and shouting singing in the vocal booth. She took a rest and quickly come back and insisted to sing again. I really appreciate her working attitude, she is the artist who is always looking for the best performance. Once again, we got a take that both of us and the record company are happy.
Later, the record company decided to put this track as the one of the single in the album, and that was last year.
2 days ago, I got a message in facebok. Boaz Arad, a journalist from “Yedioth Ahronoth” ( The biggest Israeli daily newspaper) who now stays in Beijing has heard our version of “In The Heat of Tel Aviv”. After some talk over the phone, he told me that he will publish this feel good story about Israeli hit pop song now got it’s own Chinese “version” being played to millions and millions of people in mainland China and in HK. I was a bit shocked and excited. Seems like there is a shapeless bridge between me and somewhere I don’t know much – Israel.
Yesterday, Boaz sent me a copy of the newspaper:
In English:
The Headline is: “A Tart in a Mercedes Benz riding the streets of Beijing” (That’s a take off on the original Hebrew lyrics of the song)
And the sub: “A Chinese language version of Sarit Hadad’s biggest hit is rocking the dancefloors in China”
How do you say “Party”* in Chinese? A Sarit Hadad song has been doing great in the charts in China and Hong Kong and rocking the dance floors of the world’s most populated country.
Yumiko Cheng, a successful Shanghai-born film star and pop singer which now resides in Hong Kong, is very well known in China – not only because of her fantastic voice and acting skills but also because of two well-documented incidents involving wardrobe failures during live performances.
While working on her new album, which came out a little more than three months ago, her producers were looking for a good, catchy dance tune – but couldn’t find any in Hong Kong. Through Yumiko’s record company, they approached different international labels which sent them various samples and demos.
One of the record labels, EMI, sent in a copy of Sarit Hadad’s “In The Heat of Tel Aviv”, better known as “A Tart in A Mercedes Benz” – probably the Israeli singer’s greatest ever hit. Both Yumiko and her producers immediately fell for it. “It was exactly what we were looking for”, says James Ting, a Hong-Kong based music producer and DJ which worked with Yumiko on the album.
Through the record label, an official request to use the song was sent to Israeli pop star Ivri Lider, who wrote the lyrics, and Israeli dance producer Henree, who wrote the music. Both agreed. Ting didn’t change even one note in the song – only the words were completely re-written in Mandarin Chinese.
The song, now telling the story of everlasting love and called “Five Centuries”, is doing very well in the charts and, according to Ting, is being promoted heavily by Yumiko’s record company which think it has “huge potential”.
And what do the Israelis behind the original song think about the new Chinese version? Ivri Lider heard it yesterday for the first time and thinks it’s “really cute”. Henree simply says it is “pure genius”.
“I was very surprised to hear the song”, said Sarit Hadad. “It is a big honor for me. I’d love to have an opportunity to perform it together with Yumiko. I’ve always dreamed of performing in China one day, who knows, maybe now it might happen”.
*”Party” is the name of Sarit Hadad’s famous album in which “In The Heat of Tel-Aviv” is included.
According to Boaz, this story had massive impact in Israel – an amazing feat considering they are two days away from general elections. It was picked up by every possible tv and radio show, which played Yumiko’s song back to back with the original, and discussed in bbs’s and forums. Here (http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3668162,00.html), for example, it was picked up by Boaz’s newspaper’s own web portal. The comments are super positive, both praising Yumiko’s voice and appearance and loving the fact that an Israeli song was picked up in such an “exotic” place like China… J
Wow, I never expect something like this happen, and it seems the power of music is bringing two different cultures into one place. I wonder if there are any audience in Israel singing “In The Heat of Tel-Aviv” in Chinese…….
BeChom Shel Tel Aviv ( In The Heat of Tel-Aviv )
Hebrew version by Sarit Hadad:
Five Centries – Chinese Version by Yumiko:
Note: there is a big mistake in the opening credit of Yumiko’s music video, which it says, ” Composed by James Ting”. I only noticed this after the release of the MTV (which is already too late), the credit in the original CD clearly written: ” Composed by Co Lider, Ivri/Mizrahi, Eli (Henree)/ Au Lideer, Ivri/ Mizrahi, Eli ( Henree) Produced by JamesTing.com
great job !!!!……..man!!!
and nice website..!!
yumiko
pretty impressive !
cool!