I.    Lyrics (translated from Chinese)

The sunshine road; I run on the road.
The sunshine road; I run on the sunshine road.
Oh, Kapea Kapea, let’s hit the road.
This rainy season will not come again.
Leave the undried quilt and sleep on fragrant straw bed.
The sun bakes golden cookies for us.
Oh, Kappa, where are you going?
Now the sky has cleared up;
Sunlight spreads on your body;
I just want to run on the road.
Oh, KAPA, let’s hit the road. The rainy season has gone.
Oh, let’s hit the road.

Lyrics written by Sanmao (三毛)

一條日光的大道 我奔走大道上
一條日光的大道上 我奔走在日光的大道上
啊 Kapea Kapea 上路吧
這雨季永不再來
拋下未乾的被褥 睡芳香的稻草床
陽光為我們烤金色的餅
阿 河童你要到哪裡去
現在已經天晴
陽光灑遍你的全身
我只要在大道上奔走
啊......KAPA 上路吧 雨季過去了
啊......上路吧

Audio
Chi Yu and Li Tai-Hsiang (齊豫、李泰祥)

Li Tai-Hsiang, Lin Wen-Chun, Hsu Chien-Chun, and Li Yi-Ching (李泰祥、林文俊、徐芊君、李奕青)

II.    About this Song

Theme of the Work:
Li Tai-Hsiang said, “Sanmao’s lyrics is seemingly plain, but in fact it is filled with philosophy. In ‘The Sunshine Road,’ Kapa refers to people who live in the world of darkness, just like the Kappa mentioned in Akutagawa Ryunosuke’s novel. Sanmao apprehended Kapa’s weakness, so she said “the rainy season has gone, let’s hit the road.”

Summary/Story :
The song had a very interesting start; the song had melody first and then the lyrics. When the melody was just completed, I felt the song wasn’t good and wasn’t well-established, so I put the song aside. Until one day, the writer, Sanmao visited me and requested to hear the song “The Olive Tree.” On a whim, I also played the melody of “The Sunshine Road” without lyrics. Sanmao was surprised and thought it was a good work; she liked the song very much. But I thought the song did not have its own style, because the song was more like pop songs and the syncopation was shallow. But Sanmao had good vision and she also insisted on integrating this song with the poem work, which was written at the time. Thus, sentence by sentence, lyrics were connected to the melody of “The Sunshine Road.” During the process, for cooperating with the melody, we had to change the order of some verses. Sanmao and I also made some changes in the music and verses. Just like this, the work was completed, and we did not expect that the song was so popular.

III.    Manuscript

Handwritten notes (page 1) of the Prelude of “The Sunshine Road” (one of the eight Songs of Prairie) (1971)	Handwritten notes (page 2) of the Prelude of “The Sunshine Road” (one of the eight Songs of Prairie) (1971)	Copied handwritten piano manuscript of “The Sunshine Road in D Major” for voice, piano, trumpet, and electric bass guitar (1971)

         
IV.    Music Score

PDF: http://lth.e-lib.nctu.edu.tw/data/pdf/a%20sunny%20road.pdf
MIDI: http://lth.e-lib.nctu.edu.tw/en/data/midi/A%20Sunny%20Road.mid

To view the story of Li Tai-Hsiang, please go to Li Tai-Hsiang, the Native Musician of Taiwan.

Text and images are provided by The Native Musician of Taiwan－Tai-Hsiang Li Digital Archive, National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan