SEASON EIGHT
The China Now Music Festival begins its eighth season with a concert by The Orchestra Now performing symphonic works from four generations of living composers from China. Experience music in motion through time, from the 1980’s to today, moving contemporary composition and the fusion of Eastern and Western musical styles into the 21st century.
PROGRAM
Dai Bo (b. 1988)
Invisible Mountain prelude and passacaglia
Yu Mengshi (b. 199_)
The Lonely Camel Calf for cello and orchestra
Hai-Ye Ni, cello
Zou Hang (b. 1975)
Color of Qingdao
Color of Beijing
INTERMISSION
Ye Xiaogang (b. 1955)
The Song of the Earth for soprano, baritone, and orchestra, Op. 47
I. Tale of Sorrowful Song (Li Bai)
II. Banquet at Tao Family’s Pavilion (Li Bai)
III. Imitation of Old Poem: Long Autumn Night (Qian Qi)
IV. Song of Pick Lotus (Li Bai)
V. Feelings upon Awakening from Drunkenness on a Spring Day (Li Bai)
VI. Staying at Teacher’s Mountain Retreat, Awaiting a Friend in Vain (Meng Hao Ran), Farewell (Wang Wei)
Manli Deng, soprano
Yue Wu, baritone
ABOUT THE MUSIC
The China Now Music Festival begins its eighth season with a concert by The Orchestra Now performing symphonic works by four generations of living composers from China. Experience music in motion through time, from the 1980’s to today, moving contemporary composition and the fusion of Eastern and Western musical styles into the 21st century.
The highlight of the program is Ye Xiaogang’s epic masterpiece, The Song of the Earth. Written for orchestra, soprano and baritone in 2006, Ye’s song cycle reinterprets the same seven ancient Tang Dynasty poems which inspired Gustav Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde (1908-9). Contrasting with Mahler’s melancholic tone, Ye’s work displays a reverence for the elegance and rich musicality of Tang poetic style.
Ye Xiaogang (b. 1955) rose out of the legendary first class of composition students at the Central Conservatory of Music (CCOM) after its reopening in 1978. Ye and his fellow classmates, such as Zhou Long, Chen Yi, Tan Dun, and Bright Sheng, went on to revolutionize contemporary Chinese orchestral music. Their legacy has profoundly impacted future generations of composers raised in the crucible of CCOM’s Composition Department and beyond.
The three composers in the first half of the program represent these newer generations. The works performed explore how music can move us and transport us through space and time, and into the inner worlds of our minds. Dai Bao, born legally blind in 1988, takes us inward to contemplate not only his challenges, but also the exquisite sensitivity to sound enabled by his blindness. Young composer Yu Mengshi, born in Mongolia in the 1990’s, transports us to the vast steppes of his homeland, using a solo cello to evoke images of an expansive landscape. Classical and pop composer Zhou Hang (b. 1975) depicts the urban scenery of Ningbo and Beijing as vivid colorscapes through sound.
Artistic director Jindong Cai conducts this spectacular program to kick off the 2025 season of the China Now Music Festival, dedicated to celebrating contemporary classical music from China.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
ABOUT THE CHINA NOW MUSIC FESTIVAL
The China Now Music Festival is an annual series of events produced by the US-China Music Institute of the Bard College Conservatory of Music in collaboration with the prestigious Central Conservatory of Music, China. China Now is dedicated to promoting an understanding and appreciation of classical music from contemporary China. Each year’s festival explores a singular theme. The inaugural festival in 2018, Facing the Past, Looking to the Future: Chinese Composers in the 21st Century, presented US and world premieres of orchestral works by 11 living Chinese composers in concerts at Bard College, Carnegie Hall, and Lincoln Center. The following year, the festival presented China and America: Unity in Music at Bard College, Carnegie Hall, and Stanford University, and featured the world premiere of the symphonic oratorio Men of Iron and the Golden Spike, a major new work by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Zhou Long honoring the Chinese railroad workers of the American West on the 150th anniversary of the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. Recent seasons include Beethoven and China in 2020, Asian American Voices in 2021, East of West in 2022, The Bridge of Music in 2023, and Composing the Future in 2024.
The 2025 China Now Music Festival is presented in collaboration with the Central Conservatory of Music, China.
