Beijing folk musician Chuan Zi sings about the loss and longing of ordinary people, which earns him acclaim from critics and audiences. Photos provided to China Daily

Chuan Zi has tapped into his storied past, including eight years in jail, to become a successful folk singer dealing with the problems of ordinary people. Chen Nan reports.

At first glance, Jiang Yachuan, known as Chuan Zi, appears to be much the same as other popular folk singer-songwriters on the festival circuit, but his history is a checkered one.

The 43-year-old, dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, is about to perform at Beijing's Ditan Music Festival in early May, when he mentions his past.

"Music changed me and even saved my life so I want to share it with you," he tells the crowd, accompanied by his old friend, Du Du, an 11-year-old English Cocker Spaniel.

He repeats the same line whenever he plays and his performance comes to a climax with the song Zheng Qian Hua, which he wrote in 2007 and became an Internet hit with more than 10 million hits.

"This song was dedicated to the newborn baby of a friend of mine," he says. "His surname is Zheng and the song's title literally means making money. It's really expensive to raise a kid nowadays, so I sing about the father's worries in the song."

Chuan Zi's musical story started in prison more than 20 years ago.

Born to an ordinary Beijing family, Chuan Zi had a strict father, who he rebelled against.

Inevitably, he got into trouble and was sentenced to 13 years in jail at the age of 19 for fighting. His father refused to see him for the first four months of his sentence.

"He gave me a guitar and told me not to waste time, even in jail. I knelt down and cried in front of him," he recalls.

He says it was jail time that "put his life together". His redemption was learning to play the guitar and he gained his freedom after eight years and eight months.

He wrote more than 100 songs in prison, which are self-reflective and forward-looking.

On leaving jail, Chuan Zi went to southern China, including Shenzhen, Guangdong province, and Hainan province in 1995, to work as a bar singer.

However, his songs were not well received, since Cantonese and English songs were popular then.

"A bar manager told me that if I could sing English songs, I could make 100 yuan ($15.39) a night, which was good money then," he recalls.

The first English song he learned was Unchained Melody, from the Hollywood blockbuster Ghost, which was popular in China then. He learned the lyrics by transliterating them into pinyin.

"I couldn't speak English at all but I had to make ends meet," he giggles.

He says the need to prove himself to his father has driven him to succeed. After touring in the south, Chuan Zi started to make money, sometimes more than 1,000 yuan a night.

His biggest buy was an English Cocker Spaniel costing 6,000 yuan. She was the mother of Du Du, "the famous dog who can sing along to music".

"I found that Du Du could accompany me to Unchained Melody," he says. Now, it has become a duet.

"With music, my family and Du Du, my world has totally changed. I have a sense of belonging and my life is stable," he says.

After returning to Beijing in 2000, Chuan Zi opened a live music bar near Liujiayao. Having divorced in 2004, Chuan Zi lives with his parents and 8-year-old daughter, Jiang Muyan.

Chuan Zi says the music business needs a natural form of singing, close to everyday life and refers to his song, Xing Fu Li, or Happy Lane, which was uploaded in 2007 and was also a big Internet hit.

"Not far away from happiness, and I think it's my home. It has a beautiful name, Happy Lane, and is more than 40,000 yuan a square meter. I work hard every day but I cannot afford it," he joyfully sings, accompanying himself on the guitar.

The song was originally for a real estate company boss in Shenzhen, who asked him to write a tune about a new high-priced downtown building project.

"They promised to give me a 100-square-meter apartment as reward if the song was well-written. But when he heard it he almost fainted," he laughs. "For ordinary people, it's impossible to buy such an expensive house. I just told the truth in the song."

In 2007, he was offered a contract by Lu Zhongqiang, founder and manager of Thirteen Month record company, an indie folk rock music company.

"I had never been with a record company before though I had been singing for such a long time. I was nearly 40 years old then and I doubted myself," he says.

It was his family, again, that encouraged him to go ahead with the record label.

He released his first album, Jin Sheng Yuan, or Destiny, in 2009, which addressed the troubles of his past and opened another chapter in his musical career.

He toured with other singers in the company, including Su Yang, Ma Tiao and Wan Xiaoli, all of them grassroots folk musicians.

His new album, I Want to Get Married, was released on May 13, with a small concert at Starlive, and has his trademark style, yearning for a better tomorrow and complaining about the realities of today in a comic way.

"Oh, my future mother-in-law, I don't have much money to buy a big house but I have a real heart for your daughter, which is priceless," he sings in I Want to Get Married.

"I have never forgotten the core of my earlier music, which is simple odes to love, family, loss and longing," he says. "This is the stuff I naturally do well and will always do."

Lu, his boss and longtime friend, says, "Chuan Zi knows who he is and who he is trying to speak to, which keep his music fresh and well-received.

"This musical genre has seldom been explored. It sounds like cross-talk (comedy), close to the common people," Lu says.

Chuan Zi is accompanied by his old friend Du Du, both on and off stage.