BLIND folk singer-song writer Zhou Yunpeng makes music for ordinary people and those without a voice. His edgy lyrics speak of crushing burdens in modern life, those wallowing in wealth, and the suffering children. Zhang Qian listens.

Zhou Yunpeng, wearing hair down to his shoulders and dark glasses, stands at a lectern and talks of the intertwining of music, poetry and wine, noting that some of China's greatest poets were famous for their love of wine.

And as he speaks with humor and insight to a packed room at Fudan University, the blind folk singer-songwriter, poet and lover of literature himself sips regularly from a bottle of Chinese rice wine.

Many years ago, the almost penniless street singer performed impromptu with his acoustic guitar at a Tsinghua University hall - he was thrown out by campus guards.

Now, at 40, he has a lot more credibility and fans though folk songs and ballads are not hugely popular - he has a large online following. In 2008, he was honored as a "young leader" by the influential Southern Weekend newspaper.

At the eighth Chinese Music Awards he was named best ballad artist and best lyrics writer. Today he regularly performs, turns out self-published albums (to avoid commercialization).

His latest is "Flocks and Herds Come Down the Hill." A Shanghai Publishing house release a collection of his poems, "Spring Flames." Both came out this autumn and he is promoting them around the country.

His talk at Fudan on November 24 "The Way Up Is the Way Down," was inspired by T.S. Elliot's "Four Quartets," and the natural connection between music and poetry. The next day he performed with his acoustic guitar at Mao Live House.

The balladeer and social critic has come a long way from the poor boy who lost his sight from congenital glaucoma when he was nine years old. At that time, the visually impaired had few options: a sheltered factory job if they were lucky, begging, fortune-telling, blind massage and music.

When he completely lost his sight, he chose music and bought a guitar for 20 yuan. He didn't want to become a cliche of the blind erhu player begging on the street.

And he's come a long way from singing on the streets in Beijing from 9am to 9pm and watching out for police.

Before his talk last month, he spoke with Shanghai Daily.

"There are always obstacles in life, just like blindness for me, and whenever you overcome one, you are getting stronger," said Zhou.

"And when you get stronger, you may look for difficulties to challenge yourself, as I do sometimes."

Zhou's lyrics can be dark, edgy, gritty and funny commentaries. He and 26 artists have just released "Red Bulldozer," a collection of children's songs - proceeds will help visually impaired children.

Zhou is far from mainstream, of course, but he has a loyal following who says he gives voice to their feelings about China today. He writes for the grassroots, ordinary people, office workers, those who can't afford social insurance. He writes about China's "food chain," self-centered gold-collared elites and the life-destroying burden of buying an apartment, a must in China.

Zhou isn't melodic, his voice isn't trained, it's rough, but his presence (he's a big guy with a moustache) and his words (some in rhymed verse) are riveting.

In 2006 he rose to fame (among some circles) with his painful and still most famous song, "Chinese Kids," about child victims of various calamities - fire, flood, AIDS, addiction, coal mine collapse - and it has since been widely considered an anthem for the thousands of child victims of the Sichuan earthquake in 2008.

Roots

Born in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, in 1970, Zhou was extremely bright and supported by his factory worker parents. His mother took him by train to Shanghai, Beijing and other cities to see specialists, to no avail. But he acquired the taste for travel and always remembers the old dark green trains of his childhood, always going somewhere he wanted to go. He would later ride the trains around China to perform.

Among the last sights he remembers are the neon lights on Nanjing Road W. in Shanghai and the fireflies at night in the countryside of Zhejiang Province. Today he lives in Shaoxing in Zhejiang Province. He has a girlfriend who helps him.

Zhou writes about vision and destiny.

"A snake can only see moving things; dog's world is black-and-white; there are a thousand suns in the eyes of a dragonfly. Many fish in the deep sea are without eyes to see. What you can see and what you cannot see are all destiny. I love my destiny. She is closest to me and opens and shuts a unique door just for me."

As a teenager he was capable and as independent as possible.

"I walked around a lot with my cane; I walked across the street and avoided vehicles and I could go shopping myself."

He attended Changchun University in Jilin Province, in a rare class only occasionally recruited, for the visually impaired and studied Chinese. He traded one hour of guitar lessons for two hours of reading aloud, including Western classics. He read braille but found that many books were unavailable.

After graduation he wanted to teach in a school for the visually impaired but he was rejected. He tried a factory for people with disabilities, but he just sat there - the factory only wanted the state subsidy for taking on someone who was visually impaired. He learned "blind" massage but quit because it was boring.

So, instead he went to Beijing in 1995 with his guitar and played on the streets. Street musicians still perform his songs, like "Buying an Apartment," about mortgage slaves.

As he scraped money together, he began to travel around the country, to Kunming in Yunnan Province; Changsha in Hunan Province; Lhasa in Tibet. And everywhere he went he sang.

He drew crowds as a minstrel and balladeer and in 1997 started playing in pubs along the way.

His songs are inspired by events, stories he hears along the way, people he meets, news on the radio. Visual impairment gave him a sharp ear and sharper tongue.

"Traveling is a hobby of mine, just like some people enjoy trying different foods," he says. "Music is the way I communicate with others and express what I am thinking."

"Singing in the street wasn't easy and you had to be careful of police, just like today, but at least music is what I like," Zhou says of the old days and the tough experiences that shaped his music.

In 2007 he produced the album "Chinese Kids," with a lead song of the same name.

"Don't be a Chinese kid," the famous line, is repeated again and again, each time followed by a city, a disaster and a death toll. They include Karamay, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, where in 1994, 288 students died after all the invited officials left first the burning building. The song includes a girl in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, who starved to death alone after her drug-addict mother was arrested in 2004; 200 students who drowned in floods in Shalan Town in Heilongjiang Province in 2005. And thousands of children have been left fatherless by coal mine disasters.

On the album cover of "Chinese Kids," Zhou wrote:

"Music is not in the air; it lives in the earth, next to the ant, and opposite to the snail. When we have no way out and when we cannot speak it out. Music, please arrive."



Songs and excerpts



Buying an apartment

...

From today on, I shall work hard,

I shall work to pay off loans,

...

Even if the sky falls or the earth sinks, I have to work,

Even if the sea dries up and the rocks rot, I have to work,

...

Until one day I have paid back all the money,

My hair is gray and I am toothless.

Chinese food chain

A Hong Kong guy takes a young mistress in Shenzhen,

She falls in love with a migrant worker from Shandong,

He sends money to his girlfriend back home,

She gives the money to his brother who drinks day and night,

The brother picks a pork rib from his plate and tosses it to the dog, they depend on each other,

The dog buries it,

An ant crawls on the rib and ponders,

How many ants will it take to carry the rib home?

Music industry

Zhou produces his own albums because he wants more independence as a creative artist.

"Small studios can work just as well as big music companies," he said, "and I can be more responsible for my creation when it's not in the form of industrial production."

A usually fierce social commentator, Zhou turns to the gentler life and beauties of the countryside in his new album, "Flocks and Herds Go Downhill."

He doesn't consider his works to be protest songs, or tools for protesters. "Anger should not be our normal state and people should not ask others to be the dagger when they cannot do something themselves," he said.

Zhou is still working on the "Red Bulldozer" (like a child's toy) charity song project for visually impaired children who are financially disadvantaged. Proceeds from the sales will help provide learning equipment, computers, radios, MP3s, musical instruments and other items.

Zhou himself wished for a short-wave radio after he lost his sight, so he still be in touch with the world. A computer with voice prompt helps him communicate.

"I cannot promise lifelong happiness to kids. You cannot send a lost blind person home," said Zhou. "But you can give him a clean cane so he can find his way home by himself."