Dadon

Tibetan singer and actress

This article is about the Tibetan singer and actress. For the Israeli Paralympic swimmer, see Ami Omer Dadaon.

Dadon (Tibetan: ཟླ་སྒྲོན, Wylie: zla sgron), full name Dadon Dawa Dolma (Tibetan: ཟླ་སྒྲོན་ཟླ་བ་སྒྲོལ་མ་) is a Tibetan singer and actress.

## Biography

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Dadon was born in Tibet in 1968. In 1985, she obtained a music degree at Music Department of Central Institute for Minorities in Beijing.[1]

In 1988, she studied voice at the China Conservatory of Music in Beijing. Representing Tibet at national Chinese music competitions in 1988 and 1990, she won a silver medal each time.[2]

She made five albums in Tibet.[3] Her music, which is characterized by a mixture of traditional and popular folklore, was also critical of the situation in her country, which is considered by the Chinese authorities to be a threat to the state.[4]

Inspired by the Taiwanese singer Teresa Teng, Dadon also incorporated some styles of Tibetan rock band Rangzen Shonu after hearing a tape smuggled into Lhasa in 1988.[5]

In 1992, she decided to flee and was granted political asylum in the United States (Middletown, Connecticut).

Her defection was cited in an internal speech by the Secretary of the CPC Tibet Committee Chen Kuiyuan in 1997, as well as the TV journalist Ngawang Choephel and director of the Tibet Hotel in Lhasa Jamyang Choegyal, son of Minister Kashopa Chogyal Nyima, two other government employees.[6]

In 1997, with her 3-year-old son Tenzin Tashi, she participated in a march for Tibet led from Toronto to New York, by Thupten Jigme Norbu,[7] and the Tibetan Freedom Concert in New York.

## Film

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Dadon has worked in several films.

In 1998, she played Dolkar, the leading role in a film directed by Paul Wagner, Windhorse, partly based on her life story.[8]

In 2001, she composed the music for the film Samsara directed by Pan Nalin.

In 2006, she composed music and was a narrator of the documentary Vajra Sky Over Tibet led by John Bush.[9]

## References

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1. ^ Robert Barnett, Ronald D. Schwartz, Proceedings of the Tenth Seminar of the IATS, 2003. Volume 11: Tibetan Modernities: Notes from the Field on Cultural and Social Change, BRILL, 2008, ISBN 9004155228, p. 292
2. ^ Performances Archived 2015-06-15 at the Wayback Machine, Trinity College
3. ^ (in English) Janet Gyatso, Women in Tibet
4. ^ (in English) Phinjo Gombu, A 966-km march to save tibet. dalai lama's brother among 12 headed for new york Archived 2015-09-24 at the Wayback Machine, Toronto Star, 10 March 1997
5. ^ (in English) Tibet Information Network, Unity and discord: music and politics in contemporary Tibet, 2004, p. 83- 84 Dadon is Tibet's first pop star, and remains one of the most successful to this day.... She was inspired by the Taiwanese singer Deng Lijun, known as Teresa Teng, and emulated her singing style. However, as Henrion-Dourcy reports, another point of inspiration was Modern Tibetan songs, the 1995 cassette of the Dharamsala-based band Rangzen Shonu, 'Freedom Youth', which was smuggled into Lhasa in 1988.
6. ^ (in English) Robert J. Barnett, Beyond the collaborator-martyr model, in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, Barry Sautman and June Teufel Dreyer, see p. 45 and note 66, p. 60
7. ^ (in English) Phinjo Gombu, A 966-km march to save tibet. dalai lama's brother among 12 headed for new york Archived 2015-09-24 at the Wayback Machine, Toronto Star, 10 March 1997
8. ^ Robert Barnett, Ronald D. Schwartz, Proceedings of the Tenth Seminar of the IATS, 2003. Volume 11: Tibetan Modernities: Notes from the Field on Cultural and Social Change, BRILL, 2008, ISBN 9004155228, p. 292
9. ^ (in English) Ty Burr, Vajra Sky Over Tibet' presents beautiful scenes and a dark side, The Boston Globe, 18 August 2006

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