Musician changing lives, one note at a time

Surrounded by an endless expanse of rapeseed flowers, a dozen school-age youngsters play the accordion in the spring breeze under the warm sun. From afar, the music sounds like nature itself.

They are students at the Shuangshiping Middle School in Shegang town, Liuyang, Hunan province, and their instructor is Guo Weixiang, a retired accordionist from the provincial capital, Changsha.

Ask yourself how long it takes to teach 1,100 students to learn to play an instrument. The 67-year-old Guo, who has the highest national qualification for the accordion, can tell you. His answer is eight years.

Before retiring in 2014, Guo played accordion at the Hunan Provincial Opera and Dance Drama Theater, which was founded in 1953.

"Not every child has the gift to play, but music can ignite their passion for life and study," he said.

In 2014, he told a friend about wanting to become a volunteer teacher. The friend, who is from Shegang, told him about Shuangshiping.

Guo soon realized that most of the school's students had no previous experience with the accordion.

"The infrastructure at the school was relatively poor, but it was exactly the place I was looking for," Guo said. "I wanted to do something meaningful after retirement and contribute to society."

Declining offers of a good salary, he said he would teach for free.

In 2014, he spent 30,000 yuan ($4,431) on 20 accordions. With another 10 bought by his friend and 10 more donated by a manufacturer, Guo drove for two hours twice a month from his home in Changsha to the school 122 kilometers away.

Founded in 1975, the school is located north of Changsha, and about half its students' parents are migrant workers.

Guo leaves home at 8 am, taking the expressway and country roads and arrives at around 11. He usually has lunch with his students.

Lessons start afterward at 1 pm, and end at 6 pm. He gets home around 8:30 pm.

"He is always passionate about teaching, even though the two-hour journey must be exhausting enough for a 60-year-old," said Zhou Runsong, the former headmaster of Shuangshiping.

"I had no idea how to thank him except by encouraging our students and teachers to learn carefully and study hard."

In 2016, only two years after Guo began teaching, the school was made the provincial center for accordion playing, and since then, students have won first prizes in five provincial accordion competitions.

In 2018, Mirco Patarini, president of the Confederation Internationale des Accordeonistes, a global entity encompassing national accordion organizations from around the world, came to watch a performance. And in 2019, Xun Xinrui, one of the first to study under Guo, got 92 out of 100 in her college entrance exam for the accordion.

From not knowing what a stave is to taking part in the national college entrance exam for art, the influence of music on Shuangshiping's students has been slow but profound.

Gradually, they've also begun to play other instruments, such as the hulusi (a gourd flute) and the guzheng (a plucked zither).

"Every time I come to teach, I'm happy and I enjoy myself," Guo said. "And if I can help in any way, it makes me feel young again."

While some parents worry about what might happen if Guo stops teaching, the accordion master is way ahead of them.

In addition to training students, he's also training teachers to take over when he is not available.

After the school was granted its status as an accordion center, more funding arrived for instruments.

"It is difficult to ask these students to pay for something like an accordion, but if they are given the opportunity to play one, they can seize it," Guo said.

Guo recalled one particularly memorable moment.

"One day, we took 200 students to Changsha to perform at the Hunan Concert Hall, one of the best venues in the province," he said.

Now, 95 percent of the students at the school are able to play an instrument of some kind.

"We will continue to help more students realize their musical dreams," said Xun Mengxiong, current headmaster of Shuangshiping.

Zhu Youfang contributed to this story.