Jacky Cheung Hok-yau was born in Hong Kong on 10 July 1961 with family roots in Tianjin. In 1984 he won the first Hong Kong 18 District Amateur Singing Contest with Great Earth's Grace and signed with PolyGram Records. His 1985 debut album Smile sold some 300,000 copies in Hong Kong, and the 1986 song She from Afar further secured his standing. Named one of Cantopop's Four Heavenly Kings in 1992 alongside Andy Lau, Leon Lai and Aaron Kwok, he reached his commercial peak in the 1990s: the 1993 Mandarin album The Goodbye Kiss sold more than 1.3 million copies in Taiwan alone and over four million worldwide and earned him the title God of Songs, while Billboard named him the Most Popular Singer in Asia in 1994 and in 1995 his record sales were said to trail only Michael Jackson's. His 1995 concert tour ran to about a hundred shows in a single year and drew some two million spectators. He also acted, winning Best Supporting Actor at the 8th Hong Kong Film Awards for his role as Fly in As Tears Go By, a best-actor prize at the International Film Festival of India for July Rhapsody, and Best Original Film Song at the 25th and 32nd Hong Kong Film Awards for Perhaps, Love and for the theme of The Last Tycoon. He has continued to stage large world tours and remains a major box-office draw. He went through a low period early on before regaining momentum through hard work. In 1997 he starred in the original Cantonese musical Snow.Wolf.Lake, which ran for more than forty shows and set a precedent for Hong Kong pop musicals, later touring in a Mandarin version. He was named a Hong Kong Outstanding Young Person and took the male lead in Perhaps, Love. Through the 2000s he continued to mount large tours, including the Jacky Cheung World Tour 2007, all of them sell-outs. His 1995 tour and later megatours made him one of the biggest concert draws in the Chinese-speaking world.
Jacky Cheung set Chinese-language record-sales marks with albums such as The Goodbye Kiss and was named one of the Four Heavenly Kings of the 1990s. His voice and the scale of his concert tours carried Cantopop to a wider Chinese-speaking market, and 'God of Songs' became his byword. He also worked in cinema and won the Best Original Film Song award at the Hong Kong Film Awards twice, extending his influence across music and film.
Achievements
- 1984 · He won the first Hong Kong 18 District Amateur Singing Contest with Great Earth's Grace and signed with PolyGram Records.
- 1989 · He won Best Supporting Actor at the 8th Hong Kong Film Awards for his role in As Tears Go By.
- 1993 · His Mandarin album The Goodbye Kiss set sales records in Taiwan and elsewhere, earning him the title God of Songs.