Joseph Koo


Joseph Koo Kar-Fai, MBE, GBS, is one of the most respected composers in Hong Kong. He used the pen name Moran for Mandarin songs early in his career. He has two siblings: an older sister, the famous Chinese singer/painter Koo Mei and a younger brother, Koo Kar-Tseung.

Early life

Koo began learning music at age 17 by taking piano lessons from a Filipino music teacher, who was already giving singing lessons to Koo's sister.

Career

Koo was to attend the Berklee College of Music in Boston in the early 60s. Upon graduation he returned to Hong Kong and worked for both the Shaw Brothers and Golden Harvest movie studios, scoring, among others, the Bruce Lee films Fist of Fury and Way of the Dragon in 1972.
Koo joined TVB as their director of music in 1973, where from the late 1970s until immigrating to Canada in the 1990s, he collaborated with the lyricist Wong Jim on many memorable TV theme songs. Koo has composed over 1,200 songs in his career, many of his songs are now considered as classic Cantopop. He only has 2 notable works as a lyricist, but they are both very short in length and total number of words. One was a children's song about the ten numbers, the other was the ending 'Goodnight' jingle for Enjoy Yourself Tonight.
In 1961, he composed his first hit song 夢, which was sung by his sister Koo Mei and later another hit song 郊道. In 1974, he wrote the first Cantonese TV theme song which was the actual first popular Cantopop song.
Koo received Member of Order of the British Empire in 1982. In 1998, he received the Bronze Bauhinia Star from the Hong Kong Government. He also received other awards including Music Accomplishment Award, Highest Honour Award, Best Music Award and Best Lyric Award, Hong Kong Film Awards, Taiwan's Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards and many others.
In 2012 from 30 November to 3 December, he held a concert titled "Joseph Koo Concert 2012" at the Hong Kong Coliseum, which featured many singers including Adam Cheng, George Lam, Teresa Cheung, and Anthony Wong. In more recent years he has spent much of his time in Vancouver, Canada where he had emigrated. In 2015, he announced his retirement as a conductor, and he would significantly reduce his musical works, and move into become an oil painter like his sister.

Important works in melody

1984

Additional sources

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