Music festival unites East and West

New York's iconic Lincoln Center hosted the second day of programming for the eighth China Now Music Festival on Sunday, featuring a concert and forum presented by the US-China Music Institute of Bard College and China Daily.

The groundbreaking concert, performed by The Orchestra Now in the Rose Theater at Frederick P.Rose Hall, showcased the legacy of three generations of Chinese composers, from the 1950s through the 1980s, whose seminal works bridged music, dance and opera.

It was conducted by Jindong Cai, director of the US-China Music Institute and a professor at Bard College. An exploration of the China-United States relationship through art was also woven into the programming.

Hai-Ye Ni, principal cellist of the Philadelphia Orchestra, performed the US premiere of The Lonely Camel Calf by Chinese-Mongolian composer Yu Mengshi. She highlighted the orchestra's pivotal role in building US-China relations dating back 50 years.

"The Philadelphia Orchestra was the first American orchestra to visit China in 1973. It was (conductor) Eugene Ormandy and the whole orchestra. We still have a couple of musicians in the orchestra now who were on that tour," she said.

The US-China Music Forum followed the concert, with panelists delving into the value of continuing cross-cultural musical exchange between the two countries and reflecting on the impact of the Bard East/West Ensemble's first tour of China, which took place from June 7 to 21.

Formed in 2022, the ensemble brings together musicians from diverse backgrounds and features performances on 14 Chinese and Western instruments.

"In the past 10 to 20 years, I started to think about how we can introduce music from China to the West," said Cai, artistic director of the ensemble. "So that's how we initially started the US-China Music Institute at Bard College.

"Three years ago, I came up with the idea because of an event at the Kennedy Center (in Washington) … we thought, what if we combine Chinese instruments with Western music. That's how we created the ensemble. After that performance, I thought, 'I want this to continue.'"

Progress made

Alicia Adams, former vice-president of international programming and dance at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, reflected on the progress she helped make in US-China cultural exchange during her time at the center.

"We made a lot of progress," she said.

"I did a China festival at the Kennedy Center in 2005, when we brought over nearly 1,000 artists from China, ranging from the Beijing Opera to the Beijing People's Art Theatre.

"It was before the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and before many of these artists had performed in the US, so there was huge interest in China at the time — and in these artists."

Katherine Chernyak, a member of the Bard East/West Ensemble, described the tour — her first visit to China — as "special", adding that she felt "very lucky to visit and go there".

Panelists also emphasized the importance of continuing to foster US-China ties through the arts.

"Musicians like me and musicians like us love both countries," Cai said. "If you ask all the musicians in China and in America, I think we don't want to depart. We want to continue to work together."