Xiaohan 小寒

Genesis

Trying to be a cool kid in secondary school was hard. Xiaohan decided to learn guitar from a schoolmate next door, but had no money in her pocket. So, the duo decided to take part in a national songwriting competition, with the pure naïve intention of winning it, and using the prize money to pay for her guitar lessons. Their song barely made it, but she did win something, her first Best Lyrics trophy. 

Xiaohan took it as a sign, and continued to write lyrics for songs composed by friends, for local drama series and eventually for top-selling artists like Eason Chan 陈奕迅, Jolin Tsai 蔡依林, EXO, JJ Lin 林俊杰, A-Mei 张惠妹, Tanya Chua 蔡健雅, Khalil Fong 方大同, Stefanie Sun 孙燕姿 and many more, starting when she was pursuing her PhD degree in Virology (1996-2002) and working in A*Star research on lung cancer (till 2008). She then went on to become one of Asia’s most prolific and awarded Mandopop lyricists.

A self-proclaimed workaholic, Xiaohan usually calms her nerves by listening to melancholic indie music and movie soundtracks while doing her daily morning 10k run or long walks. She also enjoys teaching and giving talks to young adults, stating that they give her a sense of purpose and an opportunity to pass down her experience being a lyricist, author and more generally, as a human being.