Kelvin Tan

Kelvin Tan
Chinese name	陳偉聯 (Traditional)
Chinese name	陈伟联 (Simplified)
Pinyin	Chén Wěilián (Mandarin)
Birth name	Tan Wei Lian
Born	October 5, 1981 (1981-10-05) (age 30) Singapore
Other name(s)	Ah Lian (阿联) Trần Vỹ Liên
Occupation	Singer
Genre(s)	Mandopop, K-pop, J-pop
Instrument(s)	Guitar, vocals
Voice type(s)	Falsetto
Label(s)	Play Music (1 Sep 2005-1 Sep 2006) Warner Music (1 Sep 2006 - present)
Years active	2005–present

This is a Chinese name; the family name is Tan.

Kelvin Tan Wei Lian (born 5 October 1981) is a visually impaired Singaporean singer. He is better known as Weilian to his fans.

Biography

Early life

Born with Leber's congenital amaurosis, Tan worked as a street busker for a living before he took part in a singing competition in which he was crowned the overall Champion. During his busking days, he performed with his guitar at various locations in Singapore such as the Kwan Im Thong Hood Cho Temple at Waterloo Street and areas around Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) stations, drawing crowds of people who were attracted by his soulful voice.

He is the first visually disabled person in Singapore to be signed on for a product endorsement. This has created a milestone for the advertising industry in Singapore, which frequently engages celebrities and models for product endorsements.

Tan is also actively involved in various charity and social events. As one of the ambassadors for the 2005 Singapore Disability Awareness Public Education Campaign, he actively promotes awareness of the abilities and employability of people with disabilities. As a motivational speaker for Young Leaders Foundation, he inspires the young to follow their dreams. In recognition of his achievement, he was awarded The Outstanding Young Persons (TOYP) of Singapore Award 2006 (Merit Winner) for the Personal Improvement and/or Accomplishment category.

Start of singing career

On 1 September 2005 he shot to prominence when he won Project SuperStar, a Mandarin singing competition hosted by Singapore's MediaCorp TV Channel U, after garnering 64% of the 533,000 telephone votes.^[1] As the Grand Champion of Project Superstar, Tan secured a recording contract with "Play Music", a subsidiary of Warner Music.

His debut album entitled All I want is...Kelvin was released on 11 January 2006 with impressive sales record - hitting platinum status in Singapore within a period of just 5 days. It ranked second, only next to Jay Chou's Still Fantasy, in annual sales on the Top Ten Mandarin Album Sales Chart, compiled by Zaobao. The song '触摸' (pronounced as "Chu Mo" or literally Touch) won 'Best Theme Song' at the 2006 Star Awards held by MediaCorp, Singapore.^[2]

Tan is proficient in both piano and the guitar, and sings in a variety of languages and dialects. In his debut concert on 22 April 2006 at the Max Pavilion in Singapore, he sang in Mandarin, English, Thai, Cantonese and Hokkien.

Other interests

Tan is also one of only two visually disabled competitive bowlers in Singapore who had won in a bowling competition, organized by the visually handicapped associations in Singapore and in Perth, Western Australia between 1996 and 1999.

A Mandarin idol drama, titled Dream Chasers featuring Tan and fellow PSS alumni, was aired on Channel U in 2006. Tan's participation in this drama marked a milestone in Singapore's Television industry - For the first time, a visually handicapped artiste was involved as a lead role in a television drama.^[3] He has subsequently made guest appearances in other local dramas (Love Degree 0 C, The Shining Star) and variety shows.

Despite limitations to the number of roles that he can perform as an actor, he has managed to become the first visually handicapped artiste to win the acclaimed "Most Popular Newcomer" and "Top 10 Male Artiste" in Singapore's Star Awards 2006.^[4]

His transformation from busker to stardom inspired a short feature named 'Life Story', depicting how he has overcome his disability and become the first blind person in Singapore to attain fame in the regional music scene.

Tan also appeared in a highly acclaimed local movie 881 directed by the awards-winning Director Roystan Tan,^[5] released in the cinemas on 9 August 2007. He acted as a street busker (his previous profession) and sang a Hokkien song in the movie. The movie is about the unique 'getai' culture in Singapore.

In his third album, song composing skills was attempted, hence showcased more of his individual personality.

Tan always shows his natural talent in musical instruments such as the Guitar and Piano, both of which are self-taught since young due to his passion in music.

Past portfolio

On 31 August 2007, Tan debuts in Taiwan with his second album 'i. Wei Lian'. He and fellow label artiste Joi Chua, did a new music attempt by singing a rap song "Fan Cuo" which was included in the Singapore edition release. Throughout his promotional activities like guest appearances on popular Taiwan variety shows “Happy Sunday” and “Kang Xi Lai Le”, industry veterans notably passed commendable remarks of Tan’s song delivery. He was invited as guest performing artiste to attend the 7th Global Chinese Music Awards held in Hong Kong on 7 October 2007 where he duetted with Hong Kong songbird Joey Yung and presented awards to the best newcomers in the regional music industry.

In first half of 2008, he embarked on his China 'i. Wei Lian' album promotions from radio airwaves to television shows in numerous cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Wuhan. On top of these, Tan never forgot to contribute to sociey, like performing at events to raise awareness for the local blind community. In the aftermath of the Sichuan earthquake, Tan participated in the One Love fund-raising dinner in Chengdu and visited the disaster site to help victims rebuild their homes and lives. When Olympic fever hit in the second half of the year, Tan was also very honoured to be able to deliver a song performance with a Qingdao female counterpart, "Tong Zai Lan Se Xing Qiu Shang" at the opening ceremony of the sailing segment of the 2008 Beijing Paralympic Games held at Qingdao.

Latest

In Aug 2009, Tan’s third album 'Moving Notes...Kelvin Tan' was released. For the very first time, seven of his own compositions were included in this album, which reflected a level of maturity and progress made by him in music. It is also an achievement and breakthrough for him to showcase his new found talent of music composition. With a personalised album of such, he hopes he can reach out to even more people (alike to his album concept - mobile live performances). For the past few months, he has performed in different heartland areas and wowed crowds of different ages. His album also gained recognition by winning 'The Courts MV Award' for Yong Yuan De Peng You (Forever Friends) MV at the Singapore Hit Awards 2009 (hosted by Yes 933 radio station). He was also awarded 'The Most Inspirational Award' as he has overcome challenges, despite his disability and hence inspired many others.

From heartland areas in Singapore, he continued to perform in shopping malls and pubs in Malaysia. On 12 September 2009, at Malaysia's Bukit Jalil Stadium, he participated in 'T-Music Festival' (organised by Tiger Beer), whereby joined a strong cast of performers and performed his album songs. Upon his Malaysia promotional trip, he was invited to be 'Speaker for The Voice Academy' where he performed songs and encourage those disabled members. He was chosen to sing the theme song, for 2009 Mediacorp Chinese blockbuster show, titled 'Together'.

Tan also won the SONG OF THE YEAR AWARD at Singapore Entertainment Awards 2010 for his # 1 hit of the year "Break Up Letter".The song spent the most number of weeks on the Radio 1003 Chart among all the songs in 2009. Tan also won the BEST THEME SONG "Together" at Mediacorp's Star Awards 2010 Ceremony.

Tan's foray into Taiwan in 2010 is met with great success. He hit Top 5 in the Best Selling Albums Chart G Music for the first time. His previous entry was in 2007 for I.Weilian which hit #14. Tan also attracted much attention with his appearance on "Million Stars" where he received FULL SCORE for his PK performance.

Discography

Further information: Kelvin Tan discography

To date and from his debut in 2005, Tan has released 1 single, 1 Superstar compilation album, 3 studio albums, 3 repackaged albums, 2 Karaoke VCD (adapted from debut album and 3rd album) and 1 concert DVD.

Song listing on music charts

Radio Station/Song Title	Y.E.S. 93.3FM (S'pore) Highest Ranking (Weeks on chart)	883JiaFM (S'pore) Highest Ranking (Number of times on Chart)	Radio 1003 (S'pore) Highest Ranking (Weeks on Chart)	FM988 (M'sia) Highest Ranking (Weeks on Chart)	RTHK (Hong Kong) Highest Ranking (Weeks on Chart)	GCMA (Combined) Highest Ranking (Weeks on Chart)
我只是想要 (All I Want Is)	02 (11)	01 (24)	01 (07)	11 (05)	-	05 (05)
爱。恨。难 (Love . Hate)	05 (12)	08 (03)	04 (08)	-	-	-
I Love You (我爱你)	01 (09)	03 (09)	-	-	03 (04)	01 (08)
普通的人 (Ordinary Man)	05 (08)	17 (03)	01 X 2 (10)	-	-	-
亲爱的,做个好梦 (Have a sweet dream, Darling)	06 (06)	05 (09)	-	-	-	-
分手的情书 (Break Up Letter)	01 (09)	01 (07)	01 (11)	-	-	-
永远的朋友 (Forever Friends)	04 (08)	01 (06)	01 (08)	08 (07)	-	-
我们 (Together)	02 (08)	-	-	-	-	-

Achievements / Past performances / Special features

References

1. ^ Project Superstar Grand Finals Results
2. ^ Star Awards 2006 Additional awards
3. ^ MediaCorp Pte Ltd. (2006-12-21). "Dream Chasers". http://u.mediacorptv.com/dreamchasers/story.htm#eng. Retrieved 2006-12-21. 
4. ^ Star Awards 2006 Results page
5. ^ Royston Tan

External links

• WeilianKelvin - Kelvin Tan's Fan Site
• WeilianKelvin - Kelvin Tan's Blog
• WeilianKelvin - Kelvin Tan's Twitter
• WeilianKelvin - Kelvin Tan's 3rd Album Blog
• Kelvin Tan's Facebook Group
• Kelvin Tan's Official YouTube Channel
• Kelvin Tan's Chinese OMY.SG link
• Kelvin Tan's Profile in Warner Music Taiwan Site
• Kelvin Tan's Profile in Skyhigh Taiwan Site
• Kelvin Tan's China TOM.com weblink
• Kelvin Tan's Online Photo Gallery
• Disabled World
• [1]

Persondata
Name	Tan, Wei Lian Kelvin
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	5 October 1981
Place of birth	Singapore
Date of death
Place of death