He is known for writing scores for the Hou Hsiao-Hsien films Dust in the Wind (1985) and The Puppetmaster (1993), as well as for songs such as "She Is Our Darling" (伊是咱的寶貝, 1993) and "Wandering to Tamsui" (流浪到淡水, 1995).
[3] Chen Ming-chang's first musical instrument was his older brother's guitar, which his mother bought for 2700 NTD as a reward for his high school admission.
To avoid demerits he would sneak into the military instructor's office and doctor the roll call sheet before going to the guitar club.
[4] The 70s in Taiwan saw the beginning of the campus folk song movement, and it was during this time that Chen Ming-chang's natural musical talents were stirred.
After graduating from high school, he formed a musical group called the Wooden Guitar Chorus (木吉他合唱團), which consisted of his friends Jonathan Lee, Chang Bing-hui (張炳輝), Cheng Wen-kui (鄭文魁), Hu Chao-yu (胡昭宇), Chen Yung-Yu (陳永裕), Chiang Hsueh-shih (江學世), and others.
In a 2002 interview, he said that the group would practice singing during their studies at Minghsin University of Science and Technology, but since he was serving his mandatory military service at the time he couldn't participate.
In 1982, at age 26, Chen Ming-chang's father suffered from a stroke, and he went back to Beitou to help take care of him as well as help his mother run their jewelry store.
They converted the fourth floor of their house into a recording studio, where Ming-chang would teach guitar in the evenings after working in the family shop.
"[5] The question was spurred by his discovery of the music of Chen Da, a Taiwanese language folk musician representative of Hengchun.
It was around this time that Chen also learned about the 228 Incident, tearfully related to him by a drunken old man while he was on an errand in Keelung for his side business selling orchids.
According to Chen:[5] In the past the government prohibited people from speaking [in Taiwanese]; if you accidentally let some split in school they would make you stand with a placard reading "no dialects allowed."
Each song reflected a social reality of the time: "Taxi" (計程車) and "Dad's Words" (阿爸的話) were about everyday life for the people, and the song "A-Tsao Democracy" (民主阿草) was a political satire about the "Thousand Year National Assembly" (referring to the fact that most of the seats in the National Assembly, representing various provinces in China, were essentially made to be permanent members).
In 1992, after an island-wide tour of college campuses, Chen took a break from his solo career to write music for The Puppetmaster and other films.
His experiences at these events led him to write the popular song "She is Our Darling", which became the anthem for the 228 Hand-In-Hand Rally in 2004, and was also played at the end of the 326 March To Protect Taiwan (三二六護台灣大遊行) in response to the passage of the Anti-Secession Law in China.
The members of the band all had day jobs: the guitarist A-Chang (阿昌) was a judicial scrivener, bassist Steve (史帝夫) was an American lawyer, the drummer Little Huang (小黃) was a manager at a medicine factory, Huai-yi (懷一) worked in advertising, and Chen Ming-chang was growing orchids.
He has been cited for inventing a style of guitar playing that mimicked the sounds of the beiguan, nanguan and Taiwanese yueqin.
[3] His father also often took him to glove puppetry shows, where the action, puppets and songs left a deep impression on a young Ming-chang.