Yumiko Cheng

Yumiko Cheng (born Zheng Lie Qiong 鄭烈瓊 in Shanghai, China) is a Hong Kong-based Cantopop singer. Cheng was given the Japanese nickname "Yumiko" by her friends in secondary school, and upon signing with EEG, adopted it for her official stagename.^[1]

Yumiko was originally marketed as a member of the group 3T (along with Mandy Chiang and Maggie Lau), which released an EP in 2002. Yumiko's potential was, however, quickly identified by the company, and she went onto become the only member of the group to launch a string of solo releases, beginning with Yumiko The Debut EP later that year. This was followed by a second EP, DanceDanceDance (舞舞舞) and her first full-length album One2Three, in 2003.

In 2004, she released the album, Perfect Date, though made a decreasing number of media appearances due to health problems and an overall strategy re-evaluation within her company.

2005 saw a return with the lead single 'Arabian Market' (亞拉伯市場), complemented by a novel image that featured her in traditional Arabic dress. She would continue onto covering various Middle-Eastern pop hits in subsequent singles such as 'Lupine Girl' (狼女, originally sung by Aneela Mirza) in 2006, and 'Five Centuries' (五個世紀, OT:Bechom Shei In The Heart of Tel Aviv) in 2008, which became a minor hit in its own right in the Chinese dance charts, and was even mentioned in a report by a major Israeli newspaper.^[2]

Yumiko's Space, the 2005 album to which 'Arabian Market' (亞拉伯市場) belonged, otherwise showed an 80s disco/electronic influence. Veteran music producer Carl Wong (王雙駿) took on songwriting and production credits for 6 songs, including that of the second single 'Think' (想). Electronic pop duo PixelToy also contributed one song, who again appear with songwriting credits on Cheng's 2008 Mandarin album Spectacular Era (精彩年代). Cheng has interviewed in the past that Yumiko's Space remained a personal favourite of all her albums.

Aside from a career in pop music, Cheng has also starred in several films, more notably making a special guest appreance in Stanley Kwan's 2005 feature, Everlasting Regret.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yumiko_Cheng