Traditional music, heard around world, helps foreigners understand China

In addition to teaching, Liu Yuening, a dulcimer musician and professor at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, devotes much time to building knowledge of traditional Chinese music overseas.

The 51-year-old helped create China's first musical Confucius Institute in Denmark four years ago. Ever since, teachers and graduate students from the conservatory in Beijing have been visiting the European country each year to teach traditional Chinese music and proficiency on Chinese instruments.

So far, at least six traditional Chinese musical instruments have been taught at the Royal Danish Academy of Music, where the Music Confucius Institute is located.