Band offers song tribute to pandemic heroes

Inspired by touching moments in the battle against the COVID-19 pandemic, the music video Starlight pays tribute to medical workers and applauds the unity of humankind.

During the Chang'e-5 lunar exploration project last year, a memory card containing the music video was carried by the lunar probe and successfully traveled to the moon.

On April 16, a ceremony was held to bestow a certificate to the coproducer of Starlight, China Report magazine of the China International Publishing Group, along with a forum with experts and officials giving their evaluations of the music video.

Liu Jizhong, director of the lunar exploration and space program center at the China National Space Administration, says bringing the music video to the moon advocates the concept of a human community with a shared future.

The video tells the story of the battle against the COVID-19 pandemic, beginning from when the virus first struck to the time when people all around the world began working together to fight the pandemic.

Scenes in the video document daily life during the pandemic-medical workers and volunteers in different countries carrying out their everyday tasks despite physical exertion, and family members supporting one another in the face of fear and distress.

The song in Starlight was written early last year by Paul Sun, founder and lead singer of the band Off Road. Sun says the song was inspired by moving footage from the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, including a young couple kissing through the glass of a hospital room, and a child giving a nurse an "air hug" during hospital discharge.

"I also read about a woman who left a message for her daughter who works as a nurse, saying that 'I know the risk is very high and I might not see you again, but I would always support you'. These touching moments reminded me how tough the battle was and how much self-sacrifice was required," Sun says.

He recalls that the Chinese version of the song was written within a short amount of time, as he plucked the guitar strings and almost instantaneously sang the lyrics to it. The lyrics are about medical workers who despite having their own families devoted themselves to the wellbeing of total strangers.