Music of note impresses Japan

Musicians delight Tokyo audience with Chinese folk tunes during Beijing Week

The spectacular variety show Night of Beijing wowed audiences in Japan to mark the opening of Beijing Week in Tokyo on June 6.

The four-day event featured activities to celebrate the 40th anniversary of sister-city relations between Beijing and Tokyo.

Held at the National Stadium in Chiyoda, Tokyo, the show was hosted by the Beijing government and the Chinese embassy in Japan, and organized by Beijing's Culture and Tourism Bureau and Foreign Affairs Office.

Designed to envelop the audience in the richness of classic Chinese folk music and opera, the event was an absolute success, according to the organizers.

Leading the Chinese delegation for the week, Cai Qi, Party secretary of Beijing, said: "Tokyo was Beijing's first overseas sister city.

"Over the past 40 years, the two cities have maintained close bonds with each other and achieved fruitful results by cooperating in various fields.

"Both have played leading roles as capital cities and made positive contributions to deepening friendly ties between the two countries and friendship between the two peoples.

"The show, as well as Beijing Week, not only reviews the unforgettable moments in history and fruitful exchanges between the two sides, but also expresses Beijing's sincere good wishes to Tokyo," he said. "Tokyo will host the Olympic Games next summer and Beijing will host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. The Olympic Games will bring the two cities closer."

The gala night opened with a folk musical ensemble performance of Ode to Beijing by the Beijing Chinese Orchestra. The group used traditional Chinese instruments erhu (a two-stringed fiddle) and sanxian (a three-stringed plucked instrument) to paint a musical picture of the Beijing style.

It was followed by Enjoy Skiing at the Great Wall, a modern and upbeat pop song. Audience member Matsuko from Japan said of the song: "It shows the enthusiasm in Beijing for winter sports."

It was followed by famed Chinese folk musical piece Chun Jiang Hua Yue Ye, or Spring Night Scented with Flowers on a Moonlit River, combining guzheng (a Chinese zither) and shakuhachi (a Japanese flute). The shakuhachi performer, Kifu Mitsuhashi, said: "I play it (shakuhachi) with a Chinese heart."

As early as 1983, the Japanese shakuhachi master visited China. In recent years, he has traveled frequently between China and Japan. In China, he has taught many students to play the instrument, he said.

The Japanese audience was also impressed by a new arrangement of Yuan Shan, or Distant Mountains. It involved a long list of instruments: sheng (a mouth-blown free reed instrument consisting of vertical pipes), pipa (a plucked four-string lute), liuqin (a four-string mandolin), ruan (Chinese moon guitar), erhu and piano.

With the gala coinciding with Dragon Boat Festival, Chinese artists pushed the boat out by playing many festival-related creative works, such as the music piece Dragon Boat.

Zhang Hongyan, the pipa performer of the folk music piece, said that it was a solo, but later adapted to a pipa trio. This time, she collaborated with percussionist Wei Ran to integrate pipa and drums, with the pipa imitating the characteristics of the drums, together spreading the holiday cheer.

Yuriko Koike, governor of Tokyo, who attended the variety show, said: "Since Tokyo and Beijing fostered sisterly ties in 1979, exchanges in such areas as environment, education and sports and on administrative levels have been really active."

She added that the Tokyo 2020 and Beijing 2022 Olympic events allow the two cities to deepen collaboration, enhance communication and promote prosperity.

Cai said: "The two cities should learn from each other's experience in hosting the Olympic Games, work together to create a mutually beneficial and win-win future, and make positive contributions to the healthy and stable development of relations between China and Japan, and the long-term friendship between the peoples of the two countries."

yinruowei@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 06/19/2019 page7)