Shortened form for ‘Cantonese pop’, the prevalent style of commercial entertainment music that originated from Hong Kong in the late 1970s, influenced by contemporary Japanese popular music but retaining Chinese melodic characteristics. 1980s Cantopop owed much to the studio-sound of Anglo-American soft rock. Production values, including recording technology, were very high, and popular singers became teenage idols. By the 1990s, Cantopop was marketed and widely imitated in Taiwan and China.
See also China, §IV, 6(ii); Hong Kong, §II; and Taiwan, §V.
JOANNA C. LEE