[3][4] He wrote about 300 lyrics in his lifetime, and his masterpieces include "White Peony" (Chinese: 白牡丹)[5] "Youth Ridge" (青春嶺), "Bitter Heart" (心酸酸), "Anping Memories" (安平追想曲)[6] "Youthful Sorrows and Joys" (青春悲喜曲), "Farewell by the Harbor" (港邊惜別), and "Nandu Nocturne" (南都夜曲).

In 1930s Taiwan, under the active promotion and guidance of the Columbia Records,[3] Taiwanese pop songs had gradually achieved good sales figures.

[11] In 1935, JVC hired Chang Fu-hsing, a graduate of the Ueno School of Music in Tokyo (the predecessor of the present-day Tokyo University of the Arts), to head the literature and art department, and invited Lin Ching-yueh [zh], a graduate of medical school at the time and known as "songwriter physician," to write and select the lyrics for their records.

[9][3] Whether it's "White Peony", which describes the heart of a young girl in love, "Youthful Ridge",[15] "Spring Day by Day", or even "Shadow of Two Wild Geese", "Sending Out the Sails", "Sentimental Heart",[16] "The Wine Cup of Sadness", etc., all of these songs created a sensation in Taiwan at that time.

[17] There were many composers with whom Chen Ta-ju collaborated, besides Su Tung, there were also Wu Cheng-jia's [zh] "We Don't Know",[18] "Heart of the world", "Farewell by the harbor", Chen Chiu-lin's "White Peony", "Spring color in the mountains", "Seven pendulums of the Zhongshan North Road", and Kueh Giok-lan's [zh] "Nandu nocturne".

[19] Chen Ta-ju evacuated his family to Pinglin[3] and decided to enter the "Governor's Office Police Superintendent's Prisoner's Training School".

As a man of letters, it was not easy to find a job, but he could not abandon his family's livelihood, so Chen Ta-ju could only return to his old profession and write lyrics again.

On the other hand, most of the Taiwanese ballads from the Japanese rule era were banned from broadcasting by the government because they were considered to be too melancholy.