biography

Coco Zhao (1978) is a widely know and respected jazz-singer and performer. With his suave timbre and extravagant stage-personality he quickly made a name for himself in Shanghai, the Chinese capital of jazz-music.

Back in the 20th century, the busy port town of Shanghai had been exposed to colonial culture long enough to develop it’s own jazz-style which paired traditional folksongs with the jazz-sound emerging in the ’20’s. All through that decade and the 30’s, Shanghai continued to be a prominent jazz city. When WWII hit the world, the Shanghai jazz-scene disparaged only to reappear in the 80’s, when a more liberal course was adopted after the revolutionary regime of Mao Zedong.

When Coco Zhao, known as Zhao Ke in his own country had finished secondary school in Wuhan, he moved to Shanghai to attend the local conservatory. Upon graduation Coco was soon playing and singing in the Grand Hyatt Hotel and other locales, mingling with the local beau monde and thrilling the crowd with his daring sexual ambiguity.

His fame took him to all the key jazz-venues in China (Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong etc.) and he soon started making appearances abroad.

He has attracted huge crowds all over the world. People previously unaware of Coco instantly fell for his velvety voice and exotic looks. Many scholarships, appearances at prestigious jazz-festivals and artist-in-residence followed (a list of the most eye-catching performances/scholarships and so on)

Coco Zhao started his recording career in….., when …… was released.

Since then, a number of well received recordings have been released, including (list of works)

One of the biggest and all encompassing projects Coco has been engaged in is a Big Band recording that will finally see the light of day at the end of 2020 in a collaboration between Zip Records and JZ Music (China).

Never failing to challenge himself, Coco has also recently recorded a couple of jazzy pop songs to be released in the course of the late summer and fall of 2020 by Zip Records.