"Dear... I Still Don't Know" by Zhang Xuan

The naturally creative work "Baby" became the most infectious single of 2006. On Zhang Xuan's official website, people gradually wrote down the emotions and comforts they gained from this song, be it family ties, friendship, or love... The song "Baby" became the theme song for a period of time in many people's summer of 2006. It also earned Zhang Xuan a commendable four nominations at the Golden Melody Awards in 2007.

Although Zhang Xuan became one of the biggest regrets missed by this year's Golden Melody Awards, there was no look of disappointment on her face on the night of the awards. She attended the ceremony with excitement and happiness along with many of her friends who have long been making music independently together. She applauded their outstanding performances. After the ceremony ended, she rushed to the recording studio to continue working on the recording for her new album. After finishing her work, she came to the gathering site prepared by the record company and expressed gratitude to all the staff in her speech.

The latest album "Dear... I Still Don't Know" is Zhang Xuan's first formal work after meeting teacher Li Shouquan. Despite knowing clearly that Zhang Xuan's obstinacy towards music would make things difficult for herself, teacher Li Shouquan still gave her the space and time to create her ideal music, as well as support and companionship.

In this album, apart from all songs being Zhang Xuan's own creations, she also took on the role of arranging all the songs and participated in the production work. In today's Mandarin music industry, which has developed into a production-line-like standardized process, she still insists on returning to what she believes is the ideal recording method, even though it may not yield much reward for the effort. She searched for musicians willing to create music with her, repeatedly refining the way to present the music with the musicians in the rehearsal room and the recording studio. She said that in a song, all instruments are alive, each having their own role, with the expressions of the musicians when they play, and are not merely accompaniments to the singing. Thus, under her ideals, every instrument in this album was live-recorded, and every note was created after repeated discussions and experiments between her and the musicians. Each song underwent a rebirth in such a process, resulting in this vivid album.

However, achieving such a vivid album comes at the cost of requiring more time and effort than an average album. During the recording process, many singers who entered and exited the recording studio at the same time had already finished recording an entire album and released it. The record company's staff were under pressure due to the pre-order start while worrying about not being able to release the album on time, while Zhang Xuan was still repeating "one more time" in the recording studio.

The enchanting and tormenting aspect of creation makes you always believe that the best attempt will appear in the next try. When asked why the album name was set as "Dear... I Still Don't Know", Zhang Xuan laughed and said that because in this continuous experimental creative process, the three sentences she said most often were "Sorry... one more time... I still don't know..."