4 Songs Shortlisted! How Steady Are Shan Yichun's Results in This Round of Re-evaluation?

I finally had some time on Saturday afternoon to scroll through my phone, and when I saw this news on the subway, my first reaction was: these results are seriously impressive. The China Musicians Association recently announced the results of the second-round evaluation for the 2025 Outstanding Songs Selection of the “Hear China, Hear You” contemporary song creation and performance event, and Shan Yichun had 4 works shortlisted in one go. For someone like me who’s short on time, the simpler the information, the more convincing it is. Seeing four songs make it into the second round together is more straightforward than reading a long article for ages.

These 4 songs are “Zhu Yu”, “Yue Shang Ge”, “A Blissful Lifetime”, and “Tian Hai Yi Xin”, which she performed as a duet with Zhou Shen. Based on the information available, these works don’t all follow a single path. Some are lyrical songs with a strong traditional Chinese flavor, while others are cross-genre collaborative pieces. In other words, this isn’t a case of racking up results with just one formula; it feels more like the same person turning in above-passing answers across different types of questions.

How should I put it? What being shortlisted for the second-round evaluation really shows isn’t that one song blew up, but the stability of sustained output. The article mentions that Shan Yichun is considered one of the “big winners” of this selection, and that’s not an exaggeration. After all, this selection, organized by the China Musicians Association, is meant to discover outstanding contemporary original songs. Being repeatedly listed in a lineup like this definitely means something.

What I personally care more about, though, is the “cost-effectiveness” behind these 4 songs. Not in the sense of money, but in whether listeners are willing to keep investing their attention. These days, everyone scrolls through playlists quickly. It’s already not easy for one song to stick in people’s minds, so for multiple works to enter the second round at the same time shows that over the past few years, she really has built up a solid foundation in both reputation and consistent output. It feels a bit like treating yourself to a pricier takeout order on a rare weekend, only to find that none of the four dishes disappoints—then next time, you’d still be willing to order again.

That said, the one with the most discussion is probably still “Tian Hai Yi Xin.” This song had already won plenty of praise from listeners before, and the reason is pretty clear: both Shan Yichun and Zhou Shen have highly distinctive voices, and their handling of details is quite refined. The biggest risk in a duet is that both singers push too hard and it ends up sounding like they’re fighting over the mic. The fact that this song keeps being brought up shows precisely that the pairing works and that the emotion really lands in listeners’ ears.

If we treat this second-round evaluation as a kind of progress report, then the signal Shan Yichun is sending is very clear: she’s not relying on one breakout hit to hold things up, but consistently delivering across different styles. For the industry, the value of this kind of singer is actually very practical, because what original music development needs isn’t just one divine hit, but people who can keep producing solid work. For ordinary listeners, this also means her upcoming releases are at least worth adding to the “listen later” list first—they won’t waste those ten-odd minutes of your commute.

That said, these 4 shortlisted songs feel more like a report card than a finish line. The second-round evaluation is only part of the process, not the final result, but it’s already enough to show one fact: Shan Yichun’s musical path in recent years has been remarkably steady. For a weekend-only listener like me, steady matters more than suspense. After all, time is limited, and attention is limited too. The people who can keep delivering reliable work are the ones most worth continuing to listen to.