Episode 75 – Women’s Words (Rainbow Chan Live at the Dream Factory)
Gabrielle Martin: Hello and welcome to Push Play, a Push Festival podcast featuring conversations with artists who are pushing boundaries and playing with form. I’m Gabrielle Martin, Push’s artistic director, and today’s episode weaves Cantopop lineages, electronic experimentation, and the matrilineal histories embedded in lament.
I’m speaking with Rainbow Chan, the artist behind Rainbow Chan Live at the Dream Factory, which is being presented at the Push Festival February 4th, 2026. Rainbow Chan is a Hong Kong-Australian vocalist, producer, and interdisciplinary artist celebrated for her inventive blend of heartfelt melody, textured electronic production, and culturally rich storytelling.
Presented for one night only on Ming Wong’s Vast Ocean Boundless Skies stage inside the Chinese Canadian Museum’s Dream Factory exhibition, this special performance fuses Cantopop, Chinese folk laments, and experimental sound into a distinctive contemporary musical experience. Rainbow’s practice bridges popular music and contemporary visual arts, exploring cultural representation, myth, translation, matrilineal histories, and diasporic heritage through works such as The Bridal Lament, which reimagines endangered Wai Tao women’s oral traditions for contemporary audiences.
Here is my conversation with Rainbow.
We’re gonna, uh, get into talking about Rainbow Chan, uh, Live at the Dream Factory, and also about some of your, you know, other projects and your wider practice. But I do wanna start, uh, by acknowledging that this conversation is taking place on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh nations.
These are ancestral traditional territories of these nations. And as we’re speaking about your work, um, and also themes of reclamation of language, lineage, and diasporic memory, I wanna acknowledge and honor the indigenous nations whose lands, uh, hold their own deep histories of story, song, and cultural continuity.
And, uh, Rainbow, where are you joining this conversation from?
Rainbow Chan: I am dialing in from the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung people of the Kulin Nation, and I pay my respects to traditional owners past and present.
Gabrielle Martin: Thanks for sharing that. And yeah, and it’s 11:00 AM. You’re, you’re in the future.
You’re tomorrow 11:00 AM- … the end of my day, the previous day. So coming from the future, I would love to hear, um… Well, first I wanna talk about, um, this Push performance actually, because this is a really unique collaboration and a really unique kind of context. So this performance, Rainbow Chan Live at the Dream Factory, is gonna happen in the Chinese Canadian Museum’s Cantopop Mandopop exhibition, and this is a space shaped by the legacies of this musical form through diaspora.
So yes, coming from the future, um, what is your relationship to Cantopop as a musical and cultural inheritance, and how does it surface sonically or emotionally within your own contemporary practice?
Rainbow Chan: Well, I was born in Hong Kong, and I moved to Australia when I was six. And according to my mom, my first words were not mom and dad, but, um, lyrics to a Cantonese pop song by the singer Aaron Kwok or ).Kwok Fu-sing.
Um, so- Wow … Cantro- yeah, Cantopop for me has been a foundational, um, cultural, uh, relic that has for me, um, been inherently connected to my ideas of home and memory and nostalgia. Uh, I think when my family moved to Australia, I was six years old, and so I was old enough to remember Hong Kong really well, and a lot of my family Are still there.
And so, uh, before the days of the internet, we had… We brought over all these cassette tapes and, um, like, videos from Hong Kong that had my favorite Cantonese pop songs on there, and that became, uh, a vessel or a marker of, you know, um, before migration for me. And so I really held onto those objects for, for a very long time, and I think when I became, you know, a, a musical artist professionally, Canto Pop and Mando Pop and even J-Pop, um, a lot of these things I consumed as a child, um, especially from the ’90s and ’80s, that era that this exhibition is specifically looking at, which I’m so pleased about I guess for me was an aesthetic framework to, um, use and to, uh, explore my own, um, uh, you know, songs of heartbreak and, and ballads and, and all the things that kind of go with Cantopop, which I think is really fun and colorful and vibrant.
So in that era, I think particularly there was a lot of, like, idols and boy bands and girl bands, and everything was quite camp. Like, the aesthetics is really over the top with, um, uh, kind of flowery, um, uh, you know, costumes and, and stage productions. And so those elements, um, of performance and storytelling really bleed into the works that I make.
Gabrielle Martin: It’s so perfect. It’s so perfect that you are able to come and be with us while this exhibit is happening, and that Chinese Canadian Museum and PuSh are able to partner on this. It’s… Yeah, it’s gonna be special. Um, and so yeah, you know, you’re speaking to the influence of that, um, style of music and also, like, cultural, um, content on your work.
And also you’ve spoken about learning Wai Tao as a form of reclamation, this language. And so how does working in multiple vocal traditions, like Wai Tao laments, Chinese folk forms, experimental electronics, and pop shape the way you think about voice as an instrument and an archive?
Rainbow Chan: Well, I guess maybe, um, just to give a quick overview, the Wai- Wai Tao people are the first settlers of Hong Kong for, you know, listeners who are not, um, aw- a- across that.
Um, and I have Wai Tao heritage through my mom, whose clan can be f- traced back actually through her matrilineal line to the Tang clan or the first clan that settled in Hong Kong in the Song dynasty. Um, so I guess my exploration of these traditional women’s laments in the Wai Tao tradition, um, and just voice in, in general, um, stems from, I guess, my, uh, desire to work through complex human emotions and heartbreak.
And I think, you know, since time, since, since the first sunrise, humans have been using voice as that tool. It’s really a technology for, um, disseminating information. Um, it’s used as a mnemonic device and works so closely with the way we memorize and document events. So for me, um, especially after learning these traditional women’s ritual songs, I’ve really come to understand the voice as a living archive and, um, a way to, you know, um, to, to- process grief, um, for the individual and as a collective.
When you sing together, there is something I feel through that resonance and the vibrations of the voice together that triggers some kind of psychosomatic, um, experience in our, in our bodies. And I think, um, that’s the, that’s the power of the voice. Um, through not even just like, uh, through not even textual things, not even vocal, um, you know, like not even textual word-based things, but actual through, actually through the vocalization itself.
So, um, the grain of the voice being, um, inherently this very powerful tool to process emotions. Um, for me, uh, these bridal laments, um, also connect me so physically and spiritually to the past and the future in a way. Um, these songs are on the brink of disappearance, and my mom as a kid would hear them all the time.
You know, the women in my grandmother’s generation, that’s how they learnt W- you know, their craft. That’s their, their way of, um, sharing knowledge. They didn’t go to school. They passed on information in these women-only houses where they would learn to sing and, um, cook and embroider and other, you know, women’s, um, labor, you could say.
Um, but by the time my mom’s generation came around, they started going to school. Hong Kong urbanized really quickly in the ’60s, and a lot of these practices were seen as, um, you know, lower class or kind of backwards, and so they were very stigmatized. And, um, f- with these external pressures, like the generation of my mom really, uh, internalized that stigma and didn’t pass on this knowledge, um, to the younger generations.
And so for me to reclaim these songs and to connect with the elders who are still alive, you know, in their 90s and their 80s who still hol- who still hold onto this knowledge, is a way to, in a way, time travel. And, and, and when I sing these songs, it does feel like my voice is not, it’s not just my voice, but I’m, I…
my voice is almost, like, boundless, and it’s, like, traveling across time and place, um, and resonating with all the women who have sung these songs before me. So yeah, I think the voice is a, a powerful thing that transcends geographies, locations, um, and it really connects, um, us to the past, present, and future.
Gabrielle Martin: Yes, it is so powerful. Like, when I heard these songs through just watching a video, unfortunately it wasn’t live, but even through video, um, a video that I saw of The Bridal Lament, it was just absolutely powerful and, and resonating, um, in a way that made me so excited to connect with you and your work more.
Um, and so what kind of sparked that interest to learn these songs and to perform them?
Rainbow Chan: It really started with a simple question. Um, I asked my mom maybe seven years ago, um, no, it’s… can’t believe it’s been seven years. Yeah, a little while ago now. Um, whether she could teach me her mother tongue, Wai Ta Wa, the Wai Ta language.
Because yeah, I had this realization that, you know, um, if people in our generation don’t learn this language, it is gonna disappear. Um, and I, I initially just wanted to learn a few phrases, um- ‘Cause yeah, it’s an aspect of my mom’s, you know, existence that really, um, I knew it, I knew was there, but it wasn’t really something she could, um, express, you know, loudly and proudly.
Um, so for me it was really important to acknowledge that, that part of her. And, um, and she was shocked at first. She was like, “Oh, why, why do you wanna learn Wai Tong?” And I was like, “Oh, you know, I just, I’m so… I, you know, I love languages.” But for me it was just like, yeah, it just made sense to, to at least learn a few phrases.
And then, um, she had a thought that, you know, because I’m a musician, um, maybe I could learn the language through song. And even though she didn’t know how to sing the songs, she was able to connect me up with this village in the new territories in Hong Kong where a group of women, um, it just so happened these social workers who have, you know, they’re embedded in this particular community, they came across some women singing these songs in private and were like, “What?”
Like, “What are these amazing songs?” And they’re like, “Oh, everyone used to sing them. Like, this is just, like, very normal.” And then it kind of sparked this particular, this huge, like, community development project in Hong Kong. At the same time I was having this, um, you know, personal, um, questions around my own identity and my heritage.
So it was this very serendipitous, um, parallel, uh, two projects happening at the same time that we were able to connect. Uh, and then, and then it just kind of opened the floodgates. And, a- and then f- um, I didn’t even realize these songs existed. And then it was like, okay, not only do we have songs for every day where we’re thinking about farming and work and thinking through the seasons and how to, you know, when to plant what things, when to harvest what things, but then there’s this other, um, you know, uh, category of women’s songs which are for rituals, for funerals, for, for weddings.
And why are they crying at weddings? Oh, it’s because these marriages were arranged, and women actually saw marriage as a kind of death. And these songs are actually full of rage and defiance and protest against the patriarchy, where my own vision of women, Chinese women specifically in the past, are very, you know, subservient, docile, kind of Confucian women.
Oh, no. There’s this whole other, um, aspect to, to women’s words and their experiences that are so little known about. Um, and so that really compelled me to, um- Learn this material and then to not only, um, platform these historical voices and the women who still, you know, are seeing them and are my teachers and my collaborators, but also to think through what these themes of defiance and, um, and sisterhood and kinship could mean in our contemporary world when we’re so divided, you know?
And how could these songs offer a different perspective also to Hong Kong and its, you know, its place in the region and its changes in the last couple of years.
Gabrielle Martin: Um, yeah, so it’s clear that your, your sound, your practice, um, often fuses folk lineages, but also pop sensibilities, uh, or with pop sensibilities and electronic manipulation.
So when you’re crafting a piece, how do you negotiate these different musical languages and how do tradition, which you’ve been speaking about, um, and futurity animate your process?
Rainbow Chan: At the beginning of my process, it was definitely very tricky because, um, I guess for me, I had to kind of reckon with, um, a, a lot of rules around, you know, superstition and also, you know, belief systems that I didn’t necessarily subscribe to myself and there are elements of tradition, of course, that is, um, uh, steeped in patriarchy and other forms of control.
And so I think just like my personal- my personality in general and my interest in general, I like to learn the rules to break the rules. And so in a way, I, I think of tradition and f- um, and, um, you know, futurism as kind of, uh, not necessarily a binary, but like tools on a spectrum that you could use like in your toolkit.
Um, and I, and I’m not really a purist. I don’t think, um, like doing things as they are intended to be done is necessarily the most interesting outcome. And so I really love this idea of like hybridity or I like to call them imperfect translations. And I think this comes from growing up as a diasporic person where I’m, you know, like we’re third culture kids and not really quite here or there.
We’re always not enough of something. And so my approach to art making or music making is framed by that, um, by that experience, you know, that very embodied lived experience of, well, you know, there’s, there’s no perfect way to do it, so why not flip it and, and try to mishmash it a bit. And so what I like to do musically is take, um, field recordings or traditional melodies and then glitch them up, um, through digital manipulation.
So sometimes I like to do that through, you know, creating an entire, um- Kick drum pattern out of, um, instead of, like, drums, I will, like, sample, like, the grass, or I’ll sample sticks, or I’ll sample, like, um, you know, the porcelain cups they’re drinking from and then create, you know, a new rhythm out of that.
Um, and for me, they’re almost like little sonic diary entries that are so tied to time and place when I make these songs. But then the listener will hear it, and they might not necessarily know that that’s where that sound comes from, but that doesn’t really matter for me. It’s more like a palette that, um, and, and textures that, um, resonate with me more emotionally than, um, literally.
And then in terms of, um, like, using folk melodies and old melodies, I think there is something really nice about, um, singing those, honoring and paying homage to those old melodies, but then pushing the boundaries of it sonically and aesthetically and kind of complicating some of those sounds. The, the tension and the paradox is what I’m interested in.
Gabrielle Martin: Your work, you know, we’ve been talking about your, uh, contemporary music performance, uh, creation and performance, uh, and you’re also working in music theater and installation context. So what shifts for you when you’re composing or performing for a theatrical frame versus a concert stage? Um, yeah, how do dra- dramaturgy, storytelling, or embodiment enter your process in each of these different modes?
Rainbow Chan: I have to admit, I’m relatively new to the theatrical, um, context. So, you know, many, many years playing live gigs and, and kind of doing the pop performance. But then when I decided to, um, create The Bridal Lament, I knew that I wanted to, um, expand, um, the storytelling of it so that it wasn’t, um, just in the context of a, of a gig, which, which I love, but I think there were so many, um, there were so many other factors in this particular story that needed to be supported by dramaturgy, by costume, by, um, choreography and animations and, you know, the, the world-making of theater.
And so I feel very lucky that I met, um, my amazing director, uh, Tessa Leong, who, um, we, we kind of, um, worked together on another production previously called Golden Blood, and, um, I really loved making the composition and sound design for this particular play and then thought Tessa was the right person to bring The Bridal Lament to life.
And so I feel like, um, it’s… In this show, I wear so many hats. I’m a sound designer, composer, performer, writer Um, a, a translator of sorts. And so it was really important to have this external eye, um, and working in this kind of hybrid form of music and theater never done before. Um, through Tessa’s, uh, collaborative processes, I think I, I really started to understand, um, you know, the importance of world-building and, um, the way that music interacts with the lights and the costumes.
But I think on a more fundamental level, it’s that relationship between what we see on stage, the performer, and the audience. In the past, I think as a musician, I’m kind of thinking more outwards and like, “I’m gonna sing my song and you’re gonna listen,” and you could be having a cocktail in the background.
That doesn’t matter. But- In the theater space, it’s like, oh, every single detail on that stage is read. Even if you turn your head from this angle to this angle, that can denote something else. And it was the… I think what excites me about this music and theater space is that there is a precision in the way that the body is read on stage that I hadn’t really considered before.
But what’s fun about the show is that there are those really precise elements and where I have to hit a particular spot to land in that light or whatever it is, but then I shake that off in different moments, and you might just see me sipping from my water bottle like the way that, you know, a pop star does on stage, and it’s breaking out of these forms and being something a little bit, um, shape-shifting.
So that’s probably been the biggest, um, uh, I guess, um, development in my own practice, thinking through storytelling and, um, how it exists in this kind of theater space.
Gabrielle Martin: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And so, you know, we’ve been talking about how both, for The Bridal Lament, how both the album and music theater work extend, uh, your engagement with Wai Tao, um, traditions and cultural and history, and so what’s next for you?
You know, I mean, we… Also, we can talk about form, um, also about process. I mean, this has been… You mentioned that it was seven years ago when you first talked to your mom about learning Wai Tao language, and then that set you on this long journey of research and development. Um, so yeah, what are you, what are you thinking about next?
Rainbow Chan: Oh, so many things. I, I, I knew that when this project got off the ground that it was gonna be a sort of lifelong project, that I, you know, um, that there are just so many songs and so many elements of the, especially women’s knowledge, um, in Wai Tao culture that I will just continue learning and, um, you know, processing for the rest of my life and hopefully passing on to future people, too.
Um, but more specifically, I think I’m, I’m interested in thinking about laments as sort of a global contemporary practice, and I’m excited to think, um, to connect with other, um, artists and thinkers and makers who work in a similar space and to look at this resonance of, um- Voices kind of processing grief and performing the act of mourning, how that sort of is a cathartic and healing, um, process for cultures across time and space.
I think there’s a lot of, um, there is a lot of, um, need for healing in our world right now. And so, um, that seems like a really urgent, um, theme and topic for me to, to explore. Um, and I think formally, I think, um, I’m really excited about doing more interdisciplinary works where it is, um, shape-shifting between musical and theatrical and installation context.
So apart from performance, I’m also a visual artist, so, um, I have an, um, ongoing art practice where I transcribe these Woi Wurrung women’s songs onto big silk paintings and installations, um, that, uh, again, is kind of my way of, um, archiving this information, um, visually. Um, and so there’s lots of exciting things happening in that space as well.
Um, and then also, yeah, this album, Bridal Lament, is coming out in 2026, which I’m so, so excited about. I’m really, you know, um, I’m really chuffed that it’s gonna finally enter the world sonically as, um, uh, going back to the kind of pop, pop object, you know, like pop music object, which is, you know, where I came from in many ways.
Um, and then it’s just, I guess- Writing more music. I’m, I’m… I love the idea of, um, working more with ritual and ceremonial music and, um, again, playing with that tension between tradition and future. Um, and just, uh, learning, um, learning more, more tools, um, from, from people, you know, around the world, different collaborators to just keep ex- extending my artistic practice.
Gabrielle Martin: Mm-hmm. Do you have a release date for the album set?
Rainbow Chan: Uh, it is planned for, um, September of 2026, so later in the year, and there’ll be some singles in the lead up. Um, so it’s very exciting. I think people who have seen the show have been asking me for a long time, “When will you drop the album? I’ve got that song stuck in my head for the last two years.”
And I think what’s freeing about this project is, um, you know, usually with albums you feel this big push to, you know, have these timelines and to, um, ride the wave of a particular hype or whatever it is. But because it’s… this project is so much bigger than my own ego in many ways, I haven’t felt the rush to kind of be like, “I need this out.
I need to make sure the single is, you know, in time with this particular festival,” whatever it is. Um, it’s, it’s taken the time it needs to come out and, um… And, and I also feel so, uh, connected to these songs, um, which sometimes with musicians when they’ve worked on an album for ages and then they finally release it, they’re, you know, they, they’ve forgotten all about those songs and they’re onto the next thing.
But luckily, I think with this project it is this- You know, it’s this, um, intersection of so many interests of mine and personal histories that, um, it feels in a way a bit timeless for me. And so, yeah, happy to… That other people can finally hear it soon.
Gabrielle Martin: Yes, and I hope you have some music videos planned for it, because your music videos, I started YouTube searching you-
and it was such a treat. Um, really exciting, like aesthetically incredible videos. Um, of course, the music is amazing. Um, but the, yeah, the whole art direction, very strong. So yeah, will there be some music videos to look forward to?
Rainbow Chan: Yes, yes, I hope so. Great. I’m really gonna- Yeah, it’ll- video clips, again, like for me is this harking back to that kind of Cantopop, um, aesthetic.
I think there’s, uh, yeah, there’s a playful element. Like, there’s a video f- um, from the album called Pomelo Water where it’s just, like me dancing in the streets in Sydney, um, dressed up kinda like a cyborg, and it’s got this like karaoke aesthetic where it’s shot just on like home video style, and then the lyrics are, you know, scrolling on the bottom.
And so yeah, you can see a lot of those like Cantopop references quite clearly in some of the videos of this album.
Gabrielle Martin: Awesome. Um, and so going back to Cantopop, so this has been, as we’ve mentioned, very serendipitous, the, this exhibit happening to be on at the Chinese Canadian Museum, and Melissa, um, bringing your work to my attention, and us talking about, you know, this kind of alignment of Push, uh, CCM, and this exhibit.
So what… You know, we’ve talked about the Bridal Lament a lot because it’s such an incredible project that is a huge part of your practice right now. But you’re not performing the Bridal Lament. You are performing something that’s very specifically, uh, and uniquely imagined for this space and time. Um, so can you share a little bit more about what people can expect if they’re hearing this before they-
come to see you?
Rainbow Chan: Yeah, so I’m, um, going to be performing inside an installation by Ming Wong, which, um, if y- if you imagine, like massive octopus arms from the future with laser disks shooting lights out of it- um, kind of like a dome, um, which the audience will sit within. Um, that’s the space that I’m going to be performing in, which, um, is so, so amazing.
Um, uh, the set that I’m doing really is, um, I guess, uh, a survey of my pop-tastic hits
Gabrielle Martin: Yes.
Rainbow Chan: Over my career of, like, 10-plus years. Um, as well as some songs from The Bridal Lament as well. So there’s a big range in terms of flavor and, um, and, and, but they, they kind of all center around heartbreak. I, I’m a sucker for sad songs.
So it’s all these beautiful pop songs that, um, you know, uh, traverse different languages as well. So English, Mandarin, Cantonese, Wèitóu. There’s, um, all those textures in this set. Um, and you might even see me play the saxophone. There might be a saxophone solo in there, one or two. Um, I make loops live as well, so I’ve got vocal pedals and electronics, and obviously I’m singing live as well.
Um, and then the end of the set will be, um, opening up to the audience for you to join us on a karaoke session. So what’s more fun than that?
Gabrielle Martin: Yes. Um, thank you so much for sharing that. I think this is such a wonderful introduction to you, uh, for our audiences, and this is your first time performing in Vancouver, right?
Rainbow Chan: Yeah, my first time in Canada. Um, I’ve never- Okay … seen snow before, so, um, uh, it’s gonna be cold. I’ve… But-
Gabrielle Martin: We hope that we will deliver on… Yes and no. I mean, as a festival director, I, I don’t hope that we will deliver snow for you, but I know that it is very exciting for many of our guests. Um, locally, we love that we don’t always have snow, but we might-
just for you. Um, yeah, so wow, it’s really exciting for us to be the first to welcome you, and then hopefully this is opening the door for many more visits. Um, so yeah. Thanks so much for sharing and letting us know a little bit more of the incredibly rich research and the, and the eclectic, rich mix of, um, sounds and, and styles and mediums you’re working with.
Rainbow Chan: Thanks so much for having me. I can’t wait to meet you all in person.