Illustration: Lu Ting/GT

The biggest New Year's event in Shanghai if not all of China was the return of Chinese pop legend Faye Wong, whose live concert at Mercedes-Benz Arena on December 30 marked her long-awaited comeback after six years out of the spotlight.



The concert had been heavily discussed for many months prior, less because it was the 47-year-old Mandopop queen's first performance since 2010 (she is mostly unknown by millennials) and more because of the audacious price of her tickets.



Concert organizers reportedly paid 100 million yuan ($14.38 million) for the diva to perform. In order to recoup their expenditure, public tickets ranged from 1,800 yuan for nosebleed seats to 7,800 yuan for front row.



Not so expensive, you say, except that only 800 out of 8,000 tickets were released to the public; the rest went directly to ticketing agencies and scalpers, who in turn charged between 3,500 yuan and 600,000 yuan!



Everyone from working-class fans to wealthy people lamented the ridiculous prices; even Wang Sicong, son of China's richest tycoon, commented that anyone who pays those prices is "brainless."



I'm only 25, so I'm not a die-hard Faye fan like my older colleagues who grew up to her fluid voice, thought-provoking lyrics and avant-garde album art. But all the comments surrounding her sold-out concert piqued my curiosity. I wondered if her performance could possibly live up to her status.



Since I obviously could not afford a ticket, I chose to watch a live-streaming version from home, which was being exclusively Webcasted by Chinese tech giant Tencent (next-day news reports claimed that 20 million viewers had tuned in). Her emergence onstage was not unlike watching a goddess arriving from the heavens into our mortal world.



But once she opened her mouth for the first number, "Dust", I wondered if Wong had perhaps inhaled some literal dust moments before; she was instantly out of breath and her voice was cracking and screechy. Her high notes were markedly strained and her lower tones were, well, toneless.



After just a few songs, I felt embarrassed for the diva and sad for all the ordinary fans who had shelled out so much cash to see her live. Despite her visible grace, it was clear that, during all the years Wong was in hibernation, her voice had severely deteriorated. I browsed the Internet after to see if I was alone in my disappointment; I was not.



Everyone from common bloggers to professional musicians was very vocal about their dissatisfaction with Wong's vocals. Chinese singer Gong Linna posted on Weibo saying "I was so sad. Wong's ethereal voice has gone; her breath is not steady; her intonation is poor."



Some of Wong's most ardent fans argued that people shouldn't expect their heavenly queen to sing as well as she did a decade ago, and I agree. Just look at aging pop icons like Mariah Carey, whose own New Year's Eve performance at New York's Times Square made headlines after the 47-year-old (same age as Wong) simply gave up just six minutes into her set.



The huge difference is that Carey's show was free. She probably knew that she couldn't get away with charging for tickets like she did in her prime. Wong, meanwhile, has been living in a delusional bubble. Considering her famously sheltered, highly private lifestyle, she probably couldn't care less about breaking her fans' hearts - and charging them for it.



Conspiracy theories abound, with some critics suggesting that she only agreed to the concert because, now that her old records are no longer selling, she desperately needed money. Others allege that Wong's management company instructed that the tickets be priced far out of range for her ordinary fans because they didn't want her true believers to witness her fall from grace.



Faye Wong's glory days are behind her. I doubt she can launch a comeback. But one of the most surprising appearances of her concert was Wong's 20-year-old daughter Leah Dou, who provided vocal accompaniment. Dou is an emerging talent worth watching, and I have a feeling this concert was set up to highlight her more than Wong.



The opinions expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Global Times.