Songwriter accused of ‘shaming China’ with The Ice and Snow Dance, a song that is claimed to bear a strong resemblance to Disney blockbuster Let it Go

The composer of one of the official anthems of Beijing’s 2022 Winter Olympics is facing an avalanche of criticism over claims his song bears an uncanny similarity to Let it Go, the theme from Disney’s blockbuster animated film Frozen.

Zhao Zhao, an established songwriter who studied at China’s top music school and has worked with artists including Placido Domingo, is credited with composing The Ice and Snow Dance, one of 10 slushy motivational ballads chosen to represent the games.

Other tracks include Never Give Up, Snow Dream, and the chirpily named Welcome to the Great Wall for Skiing.

But, as Beijing celebrates being awarded the right to host the 2022 event, Zhao has found himself accused of of plagiarism.



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“Have you no shame?” read one of several hostile messages posted on the composer’s account on Weibo, China’s Twitter. “Can you stop plagiarising?” wrote another. “You have shamed China.”

Dozens of negative comments in Chinese languages have also been posted under a YouTube video of the song in recent days.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Ice and Snow Dance

“The plagiarism is very obvious,” said one. “This is an international sports event. If they can’t make their own music, they could at least hire some foreign producer to compose it.” Another commenter said: “[China] has such a blatant plagiarism problem and yet they still want to host the Olympics.”

One blogger created a mashup of the two songs in an attempt at proving the similarities.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest A mashup video posted to YouTube of The Ice and Snow Dance and Let It Go

The furore over the alleged ripoff was such that even respected financial magazine Caijing waded into the debate. “Some notes are almost the same as the opening line of Let it Go and the only difference is the tempo,” Caijing quoted one critic as saying.

“China does not lack excellent music composers,” asked another frustrated commentator. “Why do they need to plagiarise?”

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Zhao Zhao, a pianist born in the Chinese city of Changsha, did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.

After watching Sam Smith sing in Los Angeles earlier this year, the composer wrote on Facebook: “It’s a British pop night! Sam Smith has a nice voice and songs, sometimes I need to be touched in such a way.”

Some have leapt to Zhao’s defence, including a YouTube commenter who wrote: “[You can’t] accuse others of plagiarism without having any proof. There are strict criteria regarding plagiarism in music – it’s not plagiarism just because you say so.”

Another supporter wrote: “What counts as plagiarism? Music is all made up of notes such as do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti. Does that count as plagiarism?”