From My Wardrobe: On Chan
Singer-songwriter On Chan on a meaningful garment, goals and dreams.
Lights. Drama. Heartbeat.
Feel the crowds. Anticipation rustling among the stands. The intensity of a hundred stadium lights, ten thousand stares.
On Chan has always been driven. Driven in his desire to perform well. He knows what it is like to be pushed to his limits.
First ushered into the limelight as a finalist in a local singing contest in 2008, On Chan later joined other finalists in forming the Cantopop group C AllStar, with multiple award-winning hits in the decade to following. Growing and developing their solo careers respectively in the late 2010s, they reunited once again for the concert C AllStar Let’s Get Together concert in 2021.
Among the smattering of ballads they performed for the enthusiastic Hong Kong Coliseum crowd – like the hauntingly wistful ‘For those who stay, For those who had left’《留下來的人》, the youthful summery pop of ‘Together We Strive For A Better World’《集合吧！ 地球保衛隊》 – was the song On the Tram《我們的電車上》.
Donning a colourful custom-made ensemble, On Chan sings these words to the city he loves: ‘A station, next bend; Radiance, just ahead | Old metal gates, witness each day’s changes’ ｢下個彎 有站 前面尚有 燦爛 | 舊了的 鐵閘 沿路視察 每日變化」, as all four members of C AllStar serenaded the crowd on a revolving stage.
Paying tribute to his athletic past, the concert outfit, made by local designer Kit Wan, featured a collage of various sport jerseys, from basketball, football, to cycling. For a more personal touch, Kit Wan added a FC Barcelona scarf, as a nod to the singer’s love of the football club.
Prior to his journey of Cantopop stardom, On Chan pursued his childhood dream of becoming a football player, and was selected for the Hong Kong First Division Football League in 2007. When that dream would gradually trickle to a stop, he turned to his second love: Music.
More than a concert outfit with showstopping dramatic flair, this is an item of clothing that embodies his many aspirations, as well as the blood, sweat and tears that made it happen. Beneath all the vibrant layers are long red-and-white sleeves – cut from an actual jersey from his footballer days. The jersey is emblazoned with the Hong Kong emblem, a badge he wears proudly, on his sleeve. What carried previous unfulfilled goals, is rebirthed as the carrier of his dreams of becoming a singer and performer.
If there was a word to characterise his career and musical style and sensibilities, it would be: Change.
From the gravitas and reserved melancholia of his early discography, influenced by Brit pop and Brit rock, to later albums tapping into alternative soundscapes of lo-fi, jazz and hip hop, On Chan describes himself as an open canvas – amorphous and open to change. Of course, the biggest influence on his oeuvre is Cantopop. In time, his own style, too, from hairstyles, colour palettes, wardrobe, has evolved with his music.
This metamorphic creative process often cannot be done without his stylists, in what Kit Wan calls a ‘jamming’ session. From curating and choosing the clothes for awards and events, to designing and tailoring custom-concertwear, down to the needle-fine details of his music video attire, On Chan collaborates with his stylists through asking them to translate the emotions of his songs from an aural to visual element.
Among the cluttered shelves and boxes of a designer’s studio or a stylist’s personal wardrobe, in between rounds of fitting, materials and techniques turn the fuzzy outline of a concept, a feeling, a sound into tangible reality. Somewhere between the hookline and chord progressions, between pins and pleats, is the materialisation of compromise and creation. In all this, music is the original spark that ignites and facilitates these collaborations.
There are layers to this garment. A tinge of regret, perhaps, memories of wins and losses, camaraderie.
But there is power too. A symbol for fighting and living passionately. Renewal, transformation, and hope.
From My Wardrobe invites celebrity guests to share their thoughts on the clothes that mean the most to them.
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