Chinese folk orchestra ends U.S. tour with grand concert in Seattle

The China Broadcasting Performing Arts Troupe wound up its three-city U.S. tour Wednesday with a grand Chinese folk music performance to an enthusiastic American audience in Seattle, Washington state.

The 80-member Chinese folk orchestra put on a diversified variety of classical Chinese musical pieces featuring Peking Opera, traditional folk music and classical music that were performed with the unique traditional Chinese instruments.

The concert, titled "Enchanting China," held at the McCaw Hall in Seattle, captivated the audience with artistic charm of Chinese musical pieces played with such novel instruments as Pipa, a plucked string instrument, Bamboo Flutes, wind instruments, the Erhu, a two-stringed instrument, and Banhu, a bow-stringed instrument with a sonorous sound.

The Chinese artists transformed ancient Chinese traditions and customs into a more modern approach, creating a new form of contemporary traditional music that is a universal language bridging all the cultures of countries in the world.

Zhang Gaoxiang, deputy head of the orchestra and director of the show, said the concert wants to present to the American audience the Chinese culture that has lived for thousands of years.

"On the other hand, China is a nation with 56 ethnic groups, each of which is like a pearl shining with glowing colors representing their own ethnic characteristics," Zhang said.

Peng Jiapeng, conductor of the concert, said the orchestra had a more powerful cast this year with the joining of world renowned violin master Lyu Siqing, who played the concerto Butterfly Lovers, a folktale of the Chinese version of "Romeo and Juliet," in what he said a combination of Western music techniques and delicate-vibes of Chinese drama culture.

"I've performed the musical piece for at least hundreds of times at different concerts, and what made Butterfly Lovers a fascinating program is its ever-lasting vitality and vigor, which gave musicians different understanding of its melody during different period of their lives," Lyu said.

The Chinese orchestra came to Seattle after it performing two concerts in San Francisco on June 23 and June 24, the second stop of the troupe's U.S. tour in 2019. It started its three-city U.S. trip in Los Angeles last week, where it performed at Hollywood's Dolby Theatre in downtown L.A.