Music From China marks its 35th anniversary by paying tribute to distinguished composers Chen Yi and Zhou Long with a retrospective of their works commissioned by the group. As leading voices in contemporary Chinese music, the two composers helped lay the groundwork for new music written for traditional instruments or with Western counterparts. Their music brings together the aesthetic concepts and musical elements of East and West.
The program represents some of the most iconic works by the composers that span nearly three decades of artistic collaboration with Music From China. Chen Yi’s ebullient Chinese Fables (pipa, erhu, cello, percussion) brings some of the most beloved Chinese allegorical stories to life. Her Three Dances from China South for Chinese quartet captures the essence of colorful dance traditions of the southern region with “Lions Playing Ball,” “Bamboo Dance” and “Lusheng Dance.”
Zhou Long’s music pays close attention to timbral explorations. Heng (Eternity), one of his earliest works for Music From China using all traditional instruments, has layered tone colors, at times opaque or intense. In contrast, Mount a Long Wind is a vivid, edge-of-the-seat tone-poem. A Washington Post reviewer called it “richly imaginative …. steeped in tradition yet thoroughly 21st-century …. that transcends nationalism but retains, at its heart, a compelling and distinctive Chinese sensibility.” A new work is commissioned to Zhou Long for this concert—PipaGongs—featuring pipa, erhu, cello and a large array of percussion instruments.
Chen Yi is a Distinguished Professor at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, a prolific composer, and recipient of the Ives Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She holds a BA and MA in music composition from the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing and a DMA from Columbia University.
Dr. Chen’s music has been performed and commissioned by the world’s leading musicians and ensembles, including Yehudi Menuhin, Yo-Yo Ma, Evelyn Glennie, James Galway, the Cleveland Orchestra, the BBC, Seattle, Pacific, and Singapore Symphonies, the Brooklyn, NY, and LA Philharmonic, Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. Dr. Chen has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Lieberson Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Other honors include Lili Boulanger Award, NYU Sorel Medal Award, CalArts / Alpert Award, UT Eddie Medora King Composition Prize, ASCAP Concert Music Award, Elise Stoeger Award from Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and Honorary Doctorates from Lawrence University in WI, Baldwin-Wallace College in OH, University of Portland in OR, and The New School University in NYC.
Zhou Long is internationally recognized for creating a unique body of music that brings together the aesthetic concepts and musical elements of East and West. Winner of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for his first opera, Madame White Snake, Dr. Zhou also received the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, the 2012-2013 Elise Stoeger Prize from Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society; Masterprize and the CalArts/Alpert Award; and winning the Barlow competition and commission. He has been two-time recipient of commissions from the Koussevitzky, Fromm Music Foundations, Meet the Composer, Chamber Music America, and the New York State Council on the Arts. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim and Rockefeller Foundations, and the New York Foundation for the Arts. In 2015, Zhou Long and Chen Yi were both nominated in the 58th Grammy Award. Among the ensembles commissioning works from him are the Bavarian Radio, BBC, Kansas City, Honolulu, Pacific, Singapore and Beijing Symphonies; the Brooklyn, Tokyo, China Philharmonics; the Kronos, Shanghai, Ciompi, and Chester string quartets; Ensemble Modern-Frankfurt, the Post-Classical Ensemble, PRISM Saxophone Quartet, New York New Music Ensemble, the Chanticleer, Opera Boston, Beijing Music Festival, and musicians Yo-Yo Ma, Lan Shui, Long Yu, Tan Lihua and Leonard Slatkin. A graduate of the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, Zhou Long attended Columbia University, receiving a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in 1993. Dr. Zhou is currently Distinguished Professor of Music at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory of Music and Dance.
Music From China is a chamber ensemble performing eclectic programs of traditional Chinese music and contemporary work. Established in 1984 by Director Susan Cheng, the group has performed at such venues as the Library of Congress, Asia Society, Metropolitan Museum of Art, San Diego Museum of Art, Chautauqua Institution, 92nd Street Y, Freer & Sackler Galleries of Art; festivals including the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, American Folk Festival, Boston Early Music Festival, Skaneateles Music Festival; and colleges and universities across the U.S. including Princeton, Duke, Colgate, Vermont, Rhode Island, Texas A&M, Dayton, Pittsburgh, Indiana State, Bowdoin, Vassar, William & Mary, Peabody Conservatory and Eastman School of Music, among others. A proponent of new music, Music From China has commissioned and performed works by celebrated composers such as Chen Yi, Zhou Long, Bright Sheng, Huang Ruo, Lei Liang, Eric Moe, Mathew Rosenblum and Derek Bermel. For creative programs that combine the music of East and West, Music From China is recipient of an Adventurous Programming Commendation from Chamber Music America and the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).
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