Adai Song, also known as ADÀI, the persona under which she creates electronic dance music (EDM), is an artist today who is changing the sonic and the soul of C-pop as she occupies a space between New York City and Beijing as both a singer, producer, DJ, and songwriter. She is known for merging her own cultural heritage and history with avant-garde, contemporary, sophisticated electronic production. Her latest album, The Bloom Project, is an eight-track journey, a bold feminist take on the 1920s Shanghai shidaiqu, a mixture of Chinese folk and Western jazz that represented what modernity meant to the old Shanghai. Now, at the hands of Adai, that golden age of Shanghai blooms again, but this time with contemporary feminism, modern-day production, and more global views.
Each tune on The Bloom Project echoes with refracted histories and metamorphosed lives. Adai takes previously passive representations of women and renders them as powerful declarations of agency. “A Lost Singer” deconstructs the 1937 Zhou Xuan classic Tianya Genu, formerly a ballad about longing, into something about self-making: “Not waiting for a soulmate but instead forging her own fate.” “Night Shanghai” folds in modern-day paradoxes of youth living in neon-lit cities despite loneliness thriving underneath the ostentation of urban skylines. The production adds pulsing EDM and guzheng melodies.
Then, we enter “Make Way,” a lively reimagining of Rose, Rose, I Love You, the first Chinese pop song to bridge into the U.S. Adai flips the narrative entirely: rather than waiting to be looked at, the rose declares independence. The production is a sonic tapestry of East and West with house beats fused with pipa, koto, and Western strings as a futuristic anthem about self-empowerment.
Throughout the album, Adai’s blend of EDM, traditional Chinese instrumentation, and hip-hop evinces an experience that is unique and layered. In the song "I, I Want," she offers an exquisitely playful examination of modern love, and "Carmen 2025" uses the motifs from Bizet’s 19th-century opera and blends them with temple blocks and guzheng solos to communicate messages of rebellion and sensual freedom. Adai also takes up the beloved Chinese folk song "Jasmine Flower" in "Wild Thorny Molihua" as a more textured and layered reclamation of softness and strength. “They call me soft and pure, but never looked closely.”
Although the audio brilliance is enough, The Bloom Project also represents an extraordinary international collaboration of creative weight. Adai, in tandem with Berklee College of Music alumni and faculty, including Grammy-winning producers Zach Cooper and Ian Kimmel and music mastering specialist Rachel Alina, produced the album. It integrates multigenerational, multicultural, and continental identities. This album illustrates and symbolizes how global music can retain tradition while also boldly reshaping it.
Adai Song's artistic vision is informed by her personal and cultural identity. She uses her role as a Recording Academy member, NYFA-funded artist, and Berklee NYC faculty member as a way to elevate voices that are often unheard, while also demystifying Asian femininity in global pop culture. Her transition from extensive classical violin training to major label success, and over 70 million streams globally, showcases her commitment to authenticity.
The Bloom Project is now receiving Grammy consideration for Best Global Music Album; signs that Adai Song is firmly positioned between eras, as a modern storyteller rediscovering Shanghai's forgotten melodies and reconstructing them into present-day anthems of strength, beauty, and self-determination. With today's vast distractions and changing trends, Adai Song reminds us that genuine artistry flourishes at the intersection of relationship to heritage and the process of creation.
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