Jay Chou at a Beijing event to promote his latest Mandarin album, Jay Chou's Bedtime Stories. [Photo provided to China Daily]

In 2014, when Chou released his 13th album, Aiyo, Not Bad, he became the first singer-songwriter in China to work with QQ Music, the music streaming service of internet giant Tencent, which released his album online.

The album sold 150,000 copies and started the trend of selling digital music in the country.

Jay Chou's Bedtime Stories sold 1 million copies in less than 36 hours, with each copy selling at 20 yuan ($3), according to Cussion Pang, vice-president of Tencent.

"So far, Jay Chou has sold albums via QQ Music worth 30 million yuan. He has started an era, not just with his musical style, but also in the way music is sold," says Pang in Beijing.

Chou was raised in Linkou, Taiwan, by his mother, a schoolteacher who divorced his father when he was little.

Chou, a classically trained pianist who considers Chopin and Bruce Lee as his idols, got his break when he was spotted by Taiwan TV host Jacky Wu, who asked Chou to join his then-record company, Alfa Music, as a composer in 1998.

The shy musician didn't want to be a singer at first, but wanted to focus on writing songs for other people.

In 2000, Chou released his debut album, titled Jay, in which he recorded a collection of songs that he had written for other singers.