Wang Lee Hom was born Alexander Lee-Hom Wang on May 17, 1976 in Rochester, New York, and is the second among 3 sons. He attended Jefferson Road Elementary School, Pittsford Middle School, then Pittsford Sutherland High School in the town of Pittsford. Wang graduated from Pittsford Sutherland with high honors. As a Undergraduate he attend Williams College, where he graduated with honors, majoring in music and minoring in Asian Studies. He continued his studies in a Graduate School named Berklee School of Music in Boston, Massachusetts in their Professional Music program, with voice as his principal instrument.
In 1995, during a summer trip to visit his grandparents in Taiwan, Wang's music talent was discovered. His debut album Love Rival Beethoven (情敵貝多芬) was released by Decca Records in the winter of 1995, and received little limelight. During the time he was there Lee-Hom was asked to leave his college study to pursue a full time singing career in Taiwan. Wang insisted to stay on to finish school, and at the same time, he was able to convince Decca Records to include some of his own writings in his next album. One of his writings became the title song or zhuda (Chinese: 主打; pinyin: zhǔ dǎ) for his second album If You Heard My Song (如果你聽見我的歌). Wang continued his study at Williams College, and released Missing You (好想你) during winter break of 1996 and White Paper (白紙) during summer of 1997. His music breakthrough did not come until a year later in 1998 when Revolution (公轉自轉) was released after his graduation from Williams.
After graduating from college, Wang was able to devote his full attention to his music career. He signed with Sony BMG Taiwan and released his fifth album, Revolution (公轉自轉) on August 21, 1998. The album became a huge success and won him numerous notable awards including Best Producer of the Year and Best Male Vocalist of the 10th Golden Melody Awards in 1999. He was just 23, making him the youngest person ever to win the award in either of the two categories.
After his album Revolution his future albums were also huge success. Wang Lee hom had established himself as one of the most important, influential, and prolific artists in Chinese music, never repeating himself, Wang continued to invent and experiment with new sounds and voices. He has also coined the term "chinked-out" music to describe his music, which is heavily influenced by traditional Chinese music.
Lee-Hom musical style ranges greatly from album to album. Although he is classified as an R&B artist, Wang demonstrates competence with many styles of music ranging from traditional Mandopop, Broadway, jazz, rock, R&B, gospel, acoustic, Indipop, hip-hop, to rap. Much of the styles were infused with Chinese and Western flavor at the same time. Although he did not begin learning Mandarin until he was 18, Wang is now fluent in the language (including reading and writing) and has written most of the lyrics for his songs. So Wang lee-hom can speak English, Mandarin, French, bits of Cantonese & Japanese. Wang plays over 10 musical instruments. In his albums and live concerts, he can be heard playing piano, drums, guitar, bass, violin, vibraphone, erhu, xun, and more.
Since 1995, Wang has contributed in over 25 albums, and has sold approximately 15 million records. In addition to his music, Wang also participated in several films, he is also an environmental activist.
Discography:
Love Rival Beethoven (1995)
If You Hear My Song (1996)
Missing You(1996)
White Paper(1997)
Revolution(1998)
Impossible to Miss You(1999)
Forever’s First Day(2000)
The One and Only(2001)
Unbelievable(2003)
Shangri-La(2004)
Heroes of Earth(2005)
Change Me(2007)
Heart.Beat(2008)
(Got this information from Wikipedia.com,so information might not be all that right. Also from Leehom Wang US & Canada Fanclub at http://www.homsweethome.com/)
Wang Lee Hom is one of my favorite Taiwanese singing artist. I love his music(can't understand it but love it anyway...lol). What makes me like him more is that he is not scary to try out different musical styles. I love how he always have different types of sounds for his music. I love all his albums... well the ones I have but my favorite ones are Heroes of Earth ,Shangri-La ,and Unbelievable.
