Taipei: Taiwan-based singer-songwriter David Wong, best known for his Mandarin pop classics including "You Make Me Drunk" and "Love Breaks Everyone's Heart", has died at the age of 61, his family announced Sunday. In a statement released through a law firm on behalf of his sisters, Consulina Wong and Joann Wong, the family said Wong passed away suddenly on the morning of June 2 in Honolulu (June 3, Taipei time) at his sister's home in Hawaii. They did not provide a cause of death.

According to Focus Taiwan, Wong was born in Hong Kong on Sept. 17, 1964, and immigrated to Hawaii as a child. He graduated from the University of Hawaii with a degree in hotel management. Wong came to music by teaching himself to play the guitar, a gift from a university professor, and he eventually formed bands and performed locally before being discovered by Taiwanese producer Lee Shou-chuan. Lee brought him to Taiwan to launch a Mandarin-language music career. His debut Mandarin album in 1990, "Love Breaks Everyone's Heart," was a commercial success, establishing him as one of Taiwan's best-known pop artists.

Wong later won the Golden Melody Award for Best Arranger for the song "The Fall Of Forty Four" (1944). In 2025, he made his acting debut in the Taiwanese drama "The Outlaw Doctor", earning a Golden Bell Award nomination for Best Newcomer in a Television Series category.

According to the family statement, Wong "wrapped up his life in Taiwan" on Dec. 27, 2025, and returned to Hawaii to live with his sisters. During this final month, he remained eager to embark on a new chapter in his music career. Wong's mother, Chang Lu-heng, was the eldest daughter of Chang Hsueh-sen, the fifth son of Chinese warlord Chang Tso-lin. That made Wong a grandnephew of the famed Nationalist general Chang Hsueh-liang, known as the Young Marshal, who inherited control of Manchuria from his father in 1928. Chang Hsueh-liang is best remembered as the instigator of the Xi'an Incident of 1936, in which he detained Nationalist generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and pressured him to halt the civil war against the Chinese Communists and instead unite against Japan's military aggression.

Wong is survived by his sisters.