Terrance Lin (; born 6 July 1966) is a Taiwanese singer. He has been nominated for the
Golden Melody Awards
The Golden Melody Awards (), commonly abbreviated as GMA, is an honor awarded by Taiwan's Ministry of Culture to recognize outstanding achievement in the Mandarin, Taiwanese Hokkien, Hakka, and Formosan-languages popular and traditional music ...
5 times for
Best Mandarin Male Artist. He is known for his clear and elegant high voice, which utilizes different resonance in his head to 'mix' head voice and falsetto to effortlessly move to the high ranges and maintain power and volume despite his slight build. He has a combined range of 3 octaves but has spanned an additional octave while performing "Opera", a rearranged instrumental by
Vitas, a song he stated he cannot practice (including perform) more than 4 times a day. He later became the first Taiwanese artist to record his album in One Take and One Take Live with no further editing.
Life and career
Lin was born in Keelung, Taiwan, and is the oldest of 3 children. In 1991, as a university student, he formed the duo
Ukulele
The ukulele ( ; ); also called a uke (informally), is a member of the lute (ancient guitar) family of instruments. The ukulele is of Portuguese origin and was popularized in Hawaii. The tone and volume of the instrument vary with size and con ...
with Lee Chi and gained attention in Taiwan and Hong Kong with their debut album "Confession" (認錯). The band made 4 Mandarin albums, 2 English cover albums, and a compilation album before disbanding in 1996. He was working at a power plant in a mine, but his colleague were all killed in a landslide, so he moved on to work in his father's family publishing company, for which he is still the equivalent of
COO. In 1999, he was forced to leave the music industry to care for his mother. Nine months after the leave, his mother died, and the original publishing building was forced to rebuild due to a fire.
Lin went solo in 1995 and signed to Sony Music before setting up his own agency in 1997. In 2018, he sung Mo Dao Zu Shi's opening song "Drunken dreams of a past life".
Influences
While Terry Lin is fluent in
Taiwanese Hokkien
Taiwanese Hokkien ( , ), or simply Taiwanese, also known as Taigi ( zh, c=臺語, tl=Tâi-gí), Taiwanese Southern Min ( zh, c=臺灣閩南語, tl=Tâi-uân Bân-lâm-gí), Hoklo and Holo, is a variety of the Hokkien language spoken natively ...
, and his ancestry is in Hokkien, China, his father does not think it suits him as his voice and pronunciation are not compatible. Terry has covered songs from artists such as
Steel Heart,
Celine Dion
Céline Marie Claudette Dion (born 30 March 1968) is a Canadian singer. Referred to as the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Queen of Power Ballads", Dion's powerful, technically skilled vocals and commercially successful works have had ...
,
Queen
Queen most commonly refers to:
* Queen regnant, a female monarch of a kingdom
* Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king
* Queen (band), a British rock band
Queen or QUEEN may also refer to:
Monarchy
* Queen dowager, the widow of a king
* Q ...
,
Air Supply
Air Supply is an Australian soft rock duo formed in Melbourne, Australia, in 1975, consisting of Englishman Graham Russell (vocals, guitar) and Australian Russell Hitchcock (vocals). With record sales of 100 million worldwide, they had a suc ...
,
Vitas,
Simon & Garfunkel
Simon & Garfunkel were an American folk rock duo comprising the singer-songwriter Paul Simon and the singer Art Garfunkel. They were one of the best-selling music acts of the 1960s. Their most famous recordings include three US number-one sing ...
,
Ardian Rrusta. He cited Air Supply as one of his biggest influences.
Philanthropy
Terry Lin has been the Chairman of Taiwan Cancer Hope Fund since his mother's passing in 2001, and was awarded HKMT (Hong Kong,
Macau
Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by p ...
and Taiwan-wide) Top Philanthropist Award in 2013.
Variety show
''I Am a Singer Season 1''
In February 2013, he joined the first season of
Hunan Television
Hunan Television or Hunan TV () is a state-owned provincial satellite TV station launched on September 29, 1970. It is currently China's second-most-watched television channel, second to China Central Television's CCTV-1, although Hunan TV has oc ...
's ''
I Am a Singer'', where he finished runner-up.
''Singer 2017''
In February 2017, Lin returned as a returning singer of the ''
fifth season'' of ''I Am a Singer'', which was renamed to ''Singer'' on that same season. He once again made it to the grand finals, this time finishing in fifth place.
''Call Me By Fire''
In 2021, he joined the cast of ''
Call Me By Fire
''Call Me by Fire'' () is a 2021 China, Chinese singing reality television show broadcast on Mango TV. It features 33 male celebrities who have been in the entertainment industry for close to ten years or more competing to form a 17-member perform ...
'' as a contestant.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lin, Terry
1966 births
20th-century Taiwanese male singers
21st-century Taiwanese male singers
21st-century Taiwanese singers
Living people
Taiwanese Mandopop singers
Musicians from Keelung