Created by Eric Hung in 2022 and expanded in 2025, "Asian America in 25 Songs" is designed to be a fun way for students (high school and college) and lifelong learners to learn about key events in Asian American history. Each of the songs on this page raise important themes about Asian American experiences. Collectively, they demonstrate the wide variety of music created by Asian Americans. The list is divided into three sections: (I) Songs about Asian America before 1965, (II) Songs about Asian America between 1965 and 2000, and (III) Songs about 21st-century Asian America. To learn more about each song, click on the title or description.
Songs about Asian America Before 1965
#1: Hole hole bushi
To address labor shortages after the slave trade and slavery officially ended, many plantations and industrialists began bringing workers from Asia. Between 1885 and 1924, around 180,000 Japanese laborers came to Hawai`i to work on the sugar plantations. “Hole hole bushi” is a repertory of plantation work songs created mostly by women. They were often sung when the workers stripped dead leaves from sugar cane. Set to folk songs from the workers’ home regions, the lyrics often discussed the difficulty of plantation work. Allison Arakawa began learning “hole hole bushi” as a teenager from Harry Urata, who collected the songs from the early immigrants in the 1940s and 1950s.
#2: Dawen Wang: "Ku Li"
Chinese laborers began coming to the U.S. in large numbers in the 1850s. They worked as miners, agricultural and factory workers, and ran small businesses. Between 1865 and 1869, about 12,000 Chinese workers came to the U.S. to build the Western section of the transcontinental railroad. The work was dangerous, and over 1,000 of them died. The derogatory term "coolie" was originally used by British colonial officials to describe South Asian indentured laborers. By the mid-19th century, the term came primarily to denote both South and East Asian indentured laborers who worked overseas. Born and raised in Massachusetts, Dawen Wang is a singer-songwriter who has been based in Taiwan since 2012. A song on his first album, "Ku Li" is a tribute to the Chinese railroad workers.
#3: Kim Loo Sisters, "Gee! The Jeep Jumps!"
During the Exclusion Era, many Chinese people came to the United States as "paper sons" or "paper daughters"--people who pretended to be children of U.S. citizens. Many of these immigrants never discussed their past, even with loved ones. Some even moved to places where no one is likely to learn their true identities. One example is Louie Shear Gim. He moved to Minneapolis in the early 1910s and married a Polish American seamstress. Their first four daughters became the jazz vocal group The Kim Loo Sisters. Often dubbed the "Chinese Andrews Sisters," they performed on the vaudeville circuit, and starred in two Broadway revues in the late 1930s and early 1940s. They were also featured on a Hollywood film, recorded two soundies (for a music video jukebox), and entertained thousands of soldiers in Europe during WWII.
#4: Ma Si-Hon and Tung Kwong-Kwong perform Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata
Western classical music was introduced to China in the early 17th century, but it really took root among Chinese people until the 1920s. In the next quarter century, many important composers and performers emerged, and a few decided to study and make careers in the U.S. Among the most prominent of them are a married couple: violinist Ma Si-Hon and pianist Tung Kwong-Kwong. Tung came to the U.S. in 1946 and Ma joined her two years later. As they became established, Tung became a favorite soloist with the Boston Pops, while Ma played in the Cleveland Orchestra from 1952 to 1957. They were most famous as a violin-piano duo who performed all over Europe, North America and East Asia.
#5: Toshiko Akiyoshi Trio, "Tosh's Fantasy"
U.S. popular music became very popular in many parts of Asia in the early 20th century. Filipino musicians who worked on ocean liners brought jazz to Japan in the 1910s, and jazz scenes emerged in many urban centers by the 1920s. Born in Manuchuria in 1929, Akiyoshi--who started playing piano at age six--first learned about jazz shortly after her family's return to Japan in 1945. She began studying the genre immediately, and came to the attention of Oscar Peterson when he toured Japan in 1953. Peterson immediately arranged a recording session for Akiyoshi and his rhythm section. She came to the United States to study at the Berklee School of Music in January 1956, and quickly made a number of recordings. Recorded in September 1957, "Tosh's Fantasy" is a medley of three songs: "Down a Mountain," "Phygian Waterfall" and "Running Stream." The trio consisted of Akiyoshi, drummer Jake Hanna and her long-time collaborator, bassist Gene Cherico.
#6: Betty Inada, "Sioux City Sue"
In the early 20th century, many professions in the U.S. were not open to people of Asian descent. This led many young well-educated Asian Americans to move to their heritage countries to launch careers. Born in 1913, Betty Inada started her career singing with Japanese bands in Sacramento and performing in a vaudeville troupe in Los Angeles. Sensing that a Japanese American can never be a star jazz singer in the U.S., Inada moved to Japan in 1933 even though she had limited knowledge of Japanese language and culture. After a rough start, Inada developed a brash, shouty performing style that landed her a recording contract with Columbia Records of Japan and some movie roles. She became the most popular singer in Japan in the pre-WWII period. Inada stayed in Japan until the late 1950s, and gradually developed a smoother style, which you can hear on this 1948 recording of "Sioux City Sue."
#7: Glenn Horiuchi, "Poston Sonata"
One of the most heinous episodes in Asian American history is the unjust incarceration of 120,000 people of Japanese descent--two-thirds of whom were U.S. citizens--during World War II. The California-based Asian American jazz musicians who became prominent in the 1980s all wrote music in support of the Redress and Reparations movement, which culminated in an official apology by President Reagan and a $20,000 payment to each living survivor. A pianist, composer and shamisen player, Glenn Horiuchi (1955-2000) was one of them. He was the grandson of Saburo Sugita, a second-generation Hawaiian who was known for his shakuhachi playing and wrote songs about his incarceration experience. At the time Horiuchi wrote Poston Sonata, he lived in San Diego. The Japanese community there were largely incarcerated at the Poston War Relocation Center, and he listened intently to their many stories. Poston Sonata was a tribute to these survivors. The work is in four movements, which are entitled "Rememberance," "Internment," "Camp Scenes," and "Celebration." The second and fourth movement feature his aunt, shamisen mastern Lillian Nakano, who was incarcerated along with Sugita in the Jerome and Heart Mountain camps.
