CH25

Chris Edward always thought of himself as a lucky man.

Life had been pretty sweet for him so far.

Opportunities came unbidden, and good things happened when he seized them.

Luck got him shipped off to England for studies when he had not even thought about leaving Denmark for the rest of his life, and luck made his roommate a guitarist in a fairly famous band.

Going further back, learning piano from his grandfather, a composer of children's songs, was the start of his lucky streak.

All those lucky breaks led him to become a songwriter.

A song he penned to impress a girl got picked up by his roommate's band and blew up as a hit, which got him noticed by a promoter.

The rest, as they said, was history—a history that included a successful career in the US and a Billboard hit.

But lately, his luck seemed to have run dry.

The songs he was churning out were mediocre, and a new track he wrote got totally derailed by some U.S. political mess that had nothing to do with him.

His personal and business relationships with the people he had met since becoming successful had begun to fray, and it felt like one disaster after another was headed his way.

Usually, when he hit a rough patch like this, something always came along to turn things around.

But not this time, it seemed.

"Alex, I have to dip for a bit for a vacation."

"Again? You just took one."

"Not one of those pretend breaks wedged into my schedule. A real one."

The manager shrugged and turned his laptop screen toward Chris.

"Before you hit up the airlines, check this out."

"What is it?"

"This came in from a Korean broadcaster. Is this a song you wrote? I've never heard it before."

"Korea?"

Chris had a relatively positive image of Korea.

A chance meeting with a Korean director at an award ceremony impulsively led him to accept a role as a film music director, which turned out to be a blockbuster hit.

I got lucky.

Especially since he originally could not attend the awards ceremony because of his schedule.

"What's the song? Something for a movie?"

"Nope. K-pop."

"K-pop, you say?"

As Chris quizzically tilted his head, the manager played the video.

On the laptop screen, a group of Korean girls performed a song he had never heard before.

"This was composed by me?"

"That's what they're claiming."

"That's whack. I'd never write a progression like that."

But Chris Edward stopped short.

The song playing from the laptop, of questionable quality, was not his creation.

But he felt like he had heard it before.

Or, more precisely, the overall vibe of the song, centered around the highlighted melody, was familiar.

"Hold up, hold up."

Chris pulled the laptop closer and zoned in on the song, but he was still scratching his head.

When he rewound the track to the start for another listen, it hit him.

A song kicking off with a frosty, chill melody on a flute.

It was a song he had written.

That realization unleashed a flood of memories of when he had written the song and who he had sold it to.

He even remembered the working title he had given it back then.

<Norway Flower>.

It was a song he had written after seeing a flower blooming between patches of snow in the frigid northern part of Norway.

"Yeah, yeah, it's mine. But why'd they tweak it like this?"

"Really? Then, it's a breach of contract. It's absurd to think there's a composition by you that your agent doesn't know about."

"No, no. It's not a Chris Edward song. It's a Pelle Jørgensen song."

Pelle Jørgensen was Chris Edwards' birth name.

Considering his Danish name a hindrance in the Billboard charts, his management suggested the stage name 'Chris Edwards,' which he now used almost as if it were his real name.

"I needed money, so I participated in Song Camp. But I wasn't writing anything good, so I ended up giving them a song I had written before. <Norway Flower>."

"How did the contract go? Are you still earning royalties from it?"

"I think I sold it outright? For about ten grand?"

"You sold a composition for just ten thousand dollars?"

"At the time, it felt like a fortune. No one was looking for me, and I was broke."

"How long ago was this?"

"Five years? Six? Around that time."

"Your skills must not have been very good back then. The song is average."

Chris Edward bristled at his manager's words.

"That's nonsense. The original wasn't like this."

"Then?"

"It was originally composed for a male singer. Honestly, I thought it would fit well in a Hong Kong noir film."

"Jackie Chan?"

"Whatever. But it wasn't anything like that. Who butchered the scale like that? What's the name of the singer?"

"Way From Flower. The track is called <Flowers Bloom>."

After listening to Chris's story, the manager, Alex, pondered momentarily before navigating to another screen and showing it to Chris.

On pause, the screen displayed a young boy with pale skin holding a microphone.

"How about this?"

"What's this? Another of my compositions?"

"Uh-huh."

"I don't recall selling any other songs other than <Norway Flower>."

"Who knows? It might be your work."

Chris shrugged and hit play on the frozen screen.

The same flute-centered intro as before began to play.

'The hell? It's the same song?'

He wondered if they were showing him a cover song. He focused on the video regardless.

Alex was a capable manager and the promoter who had guided him to success on the Billboard, so Chris trusted him.

At that moment, the song began to change.

The intro starts the same, but the tone drops significantly initially.

By an octave, it seems.

It sounds dope.

But that was not the end of it.

The scale changed again after two more bars.

He could not tell exactly without listening to it on a monitor headset, but it seemed to have been lowered by about 11 semitones.

The scale changed again after that, then suddenly rose sharply.

He thought that it was funny how the boy was going up in pitch to match the scale of the song <Flowers Bloom>.

Chris Edward was all in, eyes glued to the screen, watching this boy belt it out.

He liked everything about it.

The only thing he did not like was that Si-On had to dance, but when he thought about it, that was amazing in its own way.

It was clearly a live performance without any AR, and yet Si-On was singing live for about 80% of it while busting moves.

The other 20% or so that he did not sing seemed to have been left out intentionally rather than a cop-out.

The point selection was a killer.

He knew just how to give the listeners to breathe, making it all comfy for the ears.

"Wow."

As the song wrapped, Chris Edward could not help but throw down some applause.

"This kid's a beast. How old is he? I mean, what does he do? Is he the Korean Justin Bieber or what? And this song. This is the original, and the girls covered it, right?"

"Easy, tiger. Chill and watch this interview with the Korean kid first."

"Got any subs?"

"Yep, they hooked us up with both English and Danish subs."

"Nice touch. Looks like they did their homework on me."

He felt that the Korean broadcaster, whose name he did not yet know, was planning something.

"Let's roll with the English subs. We can watch it together."

"Okay."

– I think this is the original.

– <Flowers Bloom> was probably meant for male vocals in the early stages of the composition. I think they probably changed it to fit the female vocals when they decided on a singer during the production process?

– So I didn't change a thing, I just sang the early version.

The manager, who had seen the subtitles of the interview, asked in a subdued tone.

"I've already seen this interview, and I thought it was bullshit… But seeing your reaction, maybe it's not?"

"It is bullshit."

"Huh?"

<Norway Flower> was written for a male vocalist.

The company that bought it had adapted it for female vocals.

Chris's assertion left the manager puzzled.

"Then everything he said was correct?"

"The most important part was wrong."

The song the Korean boy Han Si-On altered was not Chris's original version.

It had a similar feel.

The development centered around the main melody and the intent behind the use of certain melodies for certain expressions are alike.

Even the intentional dissonance from the interlude to the chorus is similar.

However…

The kid's version was on a different level.

At the time, Chris Edward lacked the skill to compose such a piece.

"That's not my composition; it's the ideal form I had imagined while composing."

A lack of skill did not equate to a lack of imagination for the final product.

He simply could not manifest the brilliant sound in his head into reality.

The song the Korean boy sang existed only in Chris's imagination.

The actual composition was inferior.

It was absurd.

He thought it was absurd to listen to a gender-swapped version of a song, then listen to the kid infer its original form, and then sing it in an idealized manner.

Was this merely a matter of talent?

"But Si-On, the boy, said he only altered the scale, not the arrangement?"

"Si-On, is that his name?"

"Yes."

"The name suits his voice."

"Will you answer me?"

"Ah, yes. He did alter the scale but not the arrangement. That's why there are awkward moments. But Si-On clearly completed the arrangement in his head and sang accordingly."

"How do you know?"

"You can just tell by listening."

Throughout the song, Chris could intuitively grasp the ultimate form of the song Si-On had envisioned.

Clearly, it was an incredible piece, showcasing incredible talent.

A genius, no doubt.

Meanwhile, Alex scratched his head.

Chris believed his success was due to his luck, but Alex saw it differently.

Chris was a genius in his own right.

It's just that most of his genius has to be triggered by external stimuli.

Like the moment right now.

"Hmmmmm-."

After humming a tune and piecing together a melody, Chris suddenly stood up.

"Cancel the vacation."

"You're going to Korea, aren't you?"

"Yep. I need to meet this boy, Si-On, right away."

Chris Edward believed luck had once again found him.

He even thought his recent setbacks were to ensure he could meet Si-On.

If his compositions were flowing smoothly and promotions were on track, he would not have been watching this video.

"What will you do when you meet him? Give him a song? Collaborate?"

"I don't know."

"You don't have a plan?"

Chris Edwards smirked at Alex's question.

"If you bump into a genius, expect some wild things to go down."

With that, Chris left the hotel room, leaving Alex to chuckle to himself.

What the hell is the point of hastily leaving the room when you're not even planning to go to Korea right now?

Alex, pondering this, stared at Si-On on the paused screen.

Honestly, he had not sensed the genius Chris raved about in the song.

But he trusted Chris Edwards' judgment.

"Cool, I got it. I'm forwarding an email to you. Get in touch with the broadcasting station. Find out what they want with Chris and how much they're willing to offer."

When geniuses meet, it is the manager's job to turn it into money.

And Alex was among the most capable in HR Corporation, a leading management company.

"But don't give a straight-up answer. Just approach it with a sense of curiosity."