Sunday, October 15, 2000 20:00
Ruins of St. Paul's
Free admission
PROGRAM
1. "On the Mount Taihang"
1938
Words Gui Taosheng
2. "The Rear Areas" 1941
3. "The Guerilla?" 1938
Words Xian Ke
4. Making Cotton-padded Clothes" 1937
Words Gui Taosheng
5. "In February" 1939
Words Sai Ke
6. "Youth March" 1936
Words Tian Han
7. "Full-River Red" 1943
Yellow River Cantata
Words Guang Weiran
1. "The Yellow River Boatmen's
Song"
2. "Ode to the Yellow River"
Baritone: Yang Hongji
3. "The Yellow River Runs From the Sky"
Recited: Kang Zhuang
Pipa soloist: Shi Xiaolei
4. "The Yellow River Ditty"
5. "Desponsorial by the Yellow River"
Male duet: Li Bing
Baritone: Bao Jinghui
Sanxian Soloist: Zhang Li
6. "The Yellow River Lament"
Soprano: Wang Xiufen
7. ?efending the Yellow River?
8. "Roar! Yellow River"
Conductor: Yan Liangkun
Symphony Orchestra & Chorus of the National Opera Theatre of China
Shanghai Opera House Chorus
Xian Xinghai
Xian Xinghai (1905-1945), a Chinese composer, was born in a poor fisherman?
family in Macao and loved music since childhood. He entered the Attached Middle
School of Guangzhou Lingnan University in 1918. Moved to Shanghai in 1928 and
was accepted into the National Conservatory of Music. He arrived in France at
the beginning of 1930, working and studying at the same time. Later he entered
the Paris Conservatory of Music, studying composition and conducting. He
returned to Shanghai in 1935, and was invited to teach at the Luxun School of
Fine Arts in Yanan in 1938. During this period, he produced many music works to
express the spirit of the Chinese nation and reflect the Chinese people's
heroic fight against the Japanese. He went to study in Soviet Union and died of
illness in Moscow in 1945. His representative works include: The Song of the
Salvation Army, Midnight Song, On the Taihang Mountain, To the Rear Areas of Our
Enemies, The Yellow River Cantata, The Working Cantata, Full-River Red and China
Rhapsody.
The Yellow River Cantata
The music was written by Xian Xinghai in Yanan in March 1939, and the lyrics by
Guang Weiran.
The work is divided on the following movements:
1. The Yellow River Boatmen's Song (mixed chorus);
2. Ode to the Yellow River (baritone solo);
3. The Yellow River Runs from the Sky (recital with background music);
4. The Yellow River Ditty (mixed chorus);
5. Responsorial on the Yellow river side (male antiphonal singing & mixed
chorus);
6. The Yellow River Lament (soprano solo);
7. Defending the Yellow River (unison chorus); and
8. Roar! Yellow River (mixed chorus).
This work uses the Yellow River as a setting, singing the long and brilliant
history of the Chinese nation and presenting a picture of the Chinese people's
heroic fight against the Japanese. Its music combines the techniques of modern
music and the style of anti-Japanese folk songs.