Weiqian Li
Music 1801W
Music, Society, and Culture
12/09/2014
“Little Apple” A Earworm Song in China
In this summer, one viral song, “Little Apple,” written by the Chopstick Brothers, become more and more popular overnight in China. Currently, this song has received more than 900 million views, has over 83 million search results, and 280,000 related videos on Youku, which is the China’s largest online Youtube. Some people argue that it is Chinese “Gangnam Style” (Sun). One related video it shows that Chinese paramilitary soldiers are performing a dance of the song “Little Apple” during a show by the local government. On November 24, the South Korea girl pop group T-ara released a remake of the music video of “Little Apple,” and translated most of the words to Korean. On the same day, the Chopstick Brothers performed “Little Apple” at the American Music Awards, where they were awarded the “Best International Music.”
“Little Apple” is but one example of a new style of Chinese pop music that has appeared in the last few years. Other examples include “The Most Dazzling Folk Style,” by Phoenix Legend (2012), “So Cool,” by Da Zhang Wei in 2014, CCTV Spring Festival Gala (which is the premier mainland Chinese television event of the Chinese new year), and “Chick Chick,” composed and sung by Rong Wang (2014). These pieces represent a new style of Chinese pop music: “earworm songs.” As Chinese pop music industry, the new trend the style of an earworm song became immensely popular, attracted more people, and had hugely influenced Chinese society. In my paper, I will analyze this new style of Chinese pop earworm music with the particular song “Little Apple” and its affect on Chinese society. Sacks Olivers mentioned that the first time anyone used the word of “earworm” as a literal translation by German Ohrwurm was in 1980 (42). Simply, the definition of an earworm is consciously designed by the music industry and the sound of music hooks listener’s mind over and over again; the term of “earworm” also refers to as “stuck song syndrome”(Levitin), “ Brainworm,” “ Sticky Music,” and “Catchy Tunes”(Sacks 42) and is a phenomenon in music psychology.
First of all, a Chinese earworm song has the common characteristics of the earworm as well as has a unique feature that has completely impacted the music industry and attracted people’s minds. Due to the symptom of the earworm, some musicians create more repetitive and autonomous music. So the greatest composers are masters of using the repetition because they frequently transpose the melody to variation forms or utilize the repeat marks to perform the theme of the music. On the last of the ten or fifteen minutes of Beethoven’s Third and Fourth Piano Concerto is nearly repeated the beginning of the Third Piano Concerto (Sacks 45). Furthermore, the more simple and rhythmic melody and easy and entertaining lyrics are composed, the more overwhelming majority of people are appealed to listen and remember them. Nursery rhymes and the little chants and songs have a lot of choruses and refrains that make people even young children easily sing and remember them (Sacks 45). As a result, the characteristics of a Chinese style of earworm song have the usual features of the earworm song that has repetitive movement, simple melody and rhythm, and colloquial lyric.
On the other hand, a particular characteristic of the Chinese earworm song has the traditional attributes, which greatly affect and appeal to Chinese people. The lyrics of the song might combine the Chinese literature terms with western music elements. Jay Chou, who is a famous singer, composer, and actor in China, has successfully built the combination of the Western-Chinese musical (“Jay Chou”). The melody of the Chinese earworm song is a fusion of Chinese traditional music and western pop music, such as “The Most Dazzling Folk Style.” Overall, the characteristics of a Chinese earworm song are not only the familiar features of the earworm song that is repetitive, simple, and colloquial but also has the Chinese traditional style of the pop music, which is easy to remember but damaging to the “lobes of the brain”(Sacks 43).
Now we will speak to the typical Chinese song “Little Apple.” It is sung by the Chopstick Brothers, which is a Chinese group and made up of two members Taili Wang and Yang Xiao. Taili Wang, who is the primary songwriter of this group, composed “Little Apple.” This song is according to disco sounds, which is the most popular music style rapidly spread in 1980s in China (“Funky Town: How Disco Fever in the Late‘ 70s changed”). The feature of disco is extremely simple and appeals to people to dance. This song has a steady 4/4 beat and consists of a mostly concordant beat that leads people to want to dance on the floor. The tempo of this song almost takes 126 steps per minute that makes the tune more bright, breezy, and lively. The instruments are simple, and include percussion, bass, guitar, and synthesizers. The song of the drum pattern is made by a quaver hit-hat pattern with an open hi-hat on the off-beat. Heavy and memorable bass line supports the melody of this song and drives the rhythm of the “Little Apple.” Guitar as a string instrument in this particular song is also used to lead the rhythm. In addition, there are some different sounds of tonal techniques into the music using syncopation to replace the bass guitar. As we know, the strong sound of a super consistent drumbeat, the pattern of a highly repetitive bass, and the sound of guitar made the melody and rhythm as simple as people follow. There are three main structures: verse, chorus, and bridge. The form of this song is an AABA form that follows the 8-8-8-8 formats. Of course, main movement on the “Little Apple” is A section and the chorus of section A repeats the same melody over and over again. It uses the simple and different lyric on verse 1 and verse 2. Therefore the characteristics of “Little Apple” are that the repetitive movements, the simple melodies, and the lively rhythms, which satisfy the common features of an earworm song that is irresistibly catchy with everyone.
The lyrics of the “Little Apple” meet the unusual attributes of a Chinese earworm song. The lyric of “Little Apple” is a combination of modern Chinese literature and Chinese custom. The features of modern Chinese literature are based on vernacular spoken language and written language, and contrast with Classical Chinese word style. The chorus of this song is: “you are my little, dear little apple/however I love you, it’s never too much/small red face warming my heart/lighting my life’s fire, fire, fire, fire.” They are pretty straightforward and colloquial words. And the Chopstick Brothers said that: “the little apple could be anyone such as friends, children, elders, pets, and families and they will love them forever”(Sun). Also “fire” has the meaning of the light. Speaking with the deeply traditional custom, “fire” and “red” has the meaning of flourishing and prosperous thing. It also represents people’s lives becoming better and better. Another sentence of the lyric is “ spring has come again and blooming flowers cover the hillsides /planting hope, one is sure to reap reward.” It relates to a Chinese folk adage “Chu Hua Qiu Shi,” which means the glorious flowers in spring and solid fruits in autumn. The idiom comes from the book “History of the Three Kingdoms,” which is a famous Chinese history book. Overall, musically, “Little Apple” is a totally western pop music, but lyrically, it is a compound of modern Chinese literatures, customs, and western pop music elements. This style greatly attracts people’s auditory and sensuous thoughts.
As a culture capital product, this Chinese earworm song “Little Apple” also has influenced the society of China. It highly impacts the young generation, females, and working classes. Likkanen concludes in his experiments that women suffer from more earworms than men and young people have more than old people (Likkanen). Xiaomin Zhang, who is a 76 year-old retired woman, mentions the song’s success and comments that the song strongly appeals to the old ladies who gather every morning and evening. Indeed, a comical and fun “Little Apple” music video strongly stimulates the senses of vision and feeling. Moreover, Carl Wilson illustrates Bourdieu’s interpretation that social status leads to different taste of the music (90). So the music taste of “lowbrow” (Wilson 90) is entertaining, useful, and accessible. Working classes more focus on some pragmatic points than others. “Little Apple ” becomes more and more popular because it is suitable for their taste. A Chinese earworm song like “Little Apple” is a lower culture capital product and has a fashionable, fun, and community-oriented music video. Because of the highly advanced technology, “Little Apple” perfectly impacts young generation. So it makes them follow and listen to the music. Therefore, as a community-oriented and practical product of culture capital, the simple melodies, the accessible meaning of the lyrics, and the entertaining dance steps and music videos easily make the style of “Little Apple” have enormous influences in the society of China.
Moreover, artistic taste is most complicated among people and different classes have different responses even though they enjoy the same stuff. Let’s still speak up to the new song Chinese earworm pop music “Little Apple.” The comments from the lower-class people are that they enjoy the song and it helps them relieve the stress and makes them comfortable. It extremely fits for their taste. However, the most educated, high-cultural-capital respondents dislike the new song and more like the artistic and aesthetic style of the music. Besides, they argue that the earworm song is vulgar, crazy, and “fast food artwork”(Blanc). A Chinese critic Hao Fang decried “Little Apple” as “definitely a shame for the country”(Blanc) and commented “China does not focus on the development of its cultural and creative industries”(Blanc). The middle class also has the most complex taste and greatest variety of opinions. For one thing, they like to listen to the new type of music and make their lives lively, comfortable, and relaxed. But they also respond that it is a tacky and lame type of music and can not enrich their knowledge. Similar to their status in society, their comments are adiaphorous and neutral. Thus, different classes have different taste and comments.
As a result, every style of the music is a product of cultural capital. The rapid spread and impact on people’s lives is not incidental, occasional and straightforward. Due to multiculturalism and globalization, western culture has constantly melted into Chinese society. The Chinese earworm song is a new result of a culture capital and tends toward combining a traditional, folksy style within modern and community-oriented style. From the Mckinsey firm report, it shows that more that 80 percent people in China are in middle and low classes (Lu). “Little Apple” is typical of the new style and it is suitable for their tastes. The sounds melodically easy on the ear, repetitive movements, the lively and bright rhythms, and the traditional culture characteristics enormously influence Chinese society and music industry.

Works Cited
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“Jay Chou.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 9 Dec. 2014. Web. 15 Dec. 2014.
Blanc, Sebastin. “ ‘Little Apple’: The Hit Song All of China is Singing.” news.yahoo.com. Yahoo! Inc. 20 Oct. 2014. Web. 12 Dec. 2014.
Levitin, Daniel J. This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession. New York, N.Y: Dutton, 2006. Print.
Liikkanen, Lassi A. “Music in Everymind: Commonality of Involuntary Musical Imagery.” Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition (2008): 408-412. Print.
Lu, Rachel. “A Guide to Social Class in Modern China.” tealeafnation.com. Tea Leaf Nation, LLC. 28 Apr. 2014. Web. 14 Dec. 2014.
Sacks, Oliver W. Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2007. Print.
Sun, Rebecca. “ AMAs: China’s Chopsticks Brothers Win International Song Award.” hollywoodreporter.com. The Hollywood Reporter. 24 Nov. 2014. Web. 12 Dec. 2014.
Wilson, Carl. Let's Talk About Love: Why Other People Have Such Bad Taste, New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014. Print.