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Teng Yu-hsien

Taiwanese composer (1906–1944)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMar 2, 2026
Entity authorityQ714408 ↗
Source-derived summary

Teng Yu-hsien (Chinese: 鄧雨賢; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Tēng Ú-hiân, Hakka: Then Yí-hièn; 21 July 1906 – 11 June 1944) was a Taiwanese Hakka musician. He is noted for composing many well-known Hokkien songs. Teng gave himself a Japanese-style pen-name as Karasaki Yau (唐崎夜雨) and a formal name called Higashida Gyōu (東田曉雨). Teng is regarded as the Father of Taiwanese folk songs.

Biography

Teng Yu-hsien was born in Ryūtan, Tōshien Chō (modern-day Longtan, Taoyuan) of Japanese-ruled Taiwan. He migrated to Daitotei (Twatutia) with his family when he was three years old. In 1914, Teng joined Bangka Public School (艋舺公學校). He graduated in 1920, and subsequently entered the Taihoku Normal School (modern-day National Taipei University of Education). In 1925, Teng graduated and became a teacher of the Nishin Public School (日新公學校). After he married Chung You-mei (鍾有妹) in 1926, he departed from his teaching job and went to Japan to study composition theory in the Tokyo Music Academy.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Teng Yu-hsien” is taiwanese composer (1906–1944). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Teng, Yu-hsien and Taiwanese, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1906, 1944, 1914, 1920—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1906-07-21. For this dossier, Teng, Yu-hsien and Taiwanese is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “taiwanese composer (1906–1944)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q714408. VIAF identifies the subject as 222130215. The Library of Congress control number is no2009149870. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1906, 1944, 1914 and 1920.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Teng Yu-hsien”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Teng Yu-hsien primary sources, Teng Yu-hsien archive and Teng research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Teng Yu-hsien”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Teng Yu-hsien” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.