Author Description

Product Description From the Chinese Music Monograph Series (CMMS). We review the music of China in the 20th Century, beginning with the collapse of the Qing regime. The end of the 20th Century is marked by China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO). Over the last decade Premier Zhu Rongji has adopted a partial U.S. model for China's economic development: one that is partly but substantially driven by China's internal consumption. There is no strong evidence, however, that Zhu Rongji's economic development model can sustain China's cultural development in long term. The 20th Century was a unique era filled with constant social and political turmoil, much of which were at times devastating to Chinese music. This book brings you back to the beginning of the 20th Century, the end of the two thousand years of monarchy and the beginning of the Republic, when Chinese music faced a life-or-death challenge from the West. Peng Xiuwen was China's most important conductor in the twentieth century. Peng Xiuwen, a native of Wuhan, started playing the erhu at twelve. In 1950 he joined the People's Broadcasting Station as part of the music editorial department in Chongqing. In 1952 he began his life-long work of serving the broadcasting industry as its music expert and conductor, and has directed the China Broadcasting Traditional Orchestra for the last four decades 1952-1996. Liu Mingyuan, a native of Tianjing, started playing the banhu at the age of five in 1936. In 1945 Liu Mingyuan was leading his school orchestra on the gaohu. In 1952 he started the core group of the Xinying Chinese Orchestra for the film industry. Chinese recordings of classical music did not appear in large quantities until the 1950s and the 1960s. During this golden era of Chinese recordings, Liu Mingyuan produced the most number of solo and orchestral compositions and recordings. Liu wrote the largest number of successful works among mainland artists, and elevated the per