JunJun and LinLin are the resident pandas of Momusu (at least I know that much about H!P ) but they’re not the only Chinese girls making a splash in the jpop scene.

Just in the past year, there’s several notable Chinese girls who made their debut in Japanese music:

alan has been gaining buzz amongst English jpop fans; she’s the Chinese girl of Tibetan heritage who was brought to Japan by avex. Her voice is strong, and she sings mostly majestic ballads. She actually had a small music career in China, and continues to make appearances occasionally in Chinese music shows.

Tiana Xiao was born in China but spent most of her life in the United States. She’s somewhat a prodigy, completing high school at 14 and enrolled at Cornell; she put her education on hold to pursue music, and was discovered and brought to Japan. Her sings R&B, and has led to comparisons with early Utada Hikaru. She seems to have decent mastery of Japanese, English, and Chinese – her blog is written in all three languages.

Honey PV

Maki Chang (まきちゃんぐ, makichangu) is fluent in Japanese; from her website I can’t tell where she was born, but she was schooled in Japan but is definitely of Chinese heritage. She has a powerful voice, and sings piano ballads. It’s difficult to find anything on her in English (enlighten me if you can!) but from what I’ve heard on her myspace and website, I absolutely love.

To be fair, alan is the only truly Chinese girl; Tiana is more American, while Maki is Japanese. None of these girls really market their heritage or upbringing past the initial novelty, which implies that their labels are not trying to profit off of their being Chinese but just their being musicians as a whole. It’s interesting to see these artists make their debuts not in China but in Japan instead, where most of them have no connection to Japan whatsoever. These are all talented ladies, and I look forward to seeing their impact on the Japanese music industry.