琴海音乐世界

Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra

Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra

    The Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra is a professional orchestra currently supported by the Xiamen municipal government and the Gulangyu district government,with contributions from the Fujian Electricial Power Bureau. It made its debut on September 9,1998,on the beautiful Egret Island,a.k.a. Xiamen,under the leadership of Professor Zheng Xiaoying,the most prominent female conductor in China,who remains the orchestra's Artistic Director and principal Conductor.Shince that time,the "Gulangyu Weekend Symphony" has brought to audiences more than 300 well-received concerts that have included more than 80 different programs of classical and contemporary music,domestic and from abroad.

    During performances,the "Zheng Xiao-ying System" of explaining while performing,helps people who are just becoming familiar with the symphony to be more receptive and understand more about the music.The orchestra actively advocates composition and promotion of symphonies with background stories or musical content of concern to China of Fujian.

    This they view as a duty of Chinese orchestras.They also have made short tours to 18 cities in six provines to spread the seeds of philharmonic music more widely.In April 2002,they successfully toured three cities in Japan with a Chinese symphonic epic composed by Liu Yuan, "Echo of Hakka Earth Buildings",and have been invited to perform it for an important government meeting in Beijing in November. In preparation for this Fourth International Tchaikovsky Competition for Young Musicians,the young orchestra has played 77 concertos in cooperation with 71 musicians over the past four years. Artists in the orchestra have come from across China to devote their efforts toward building Xiamen and Gulangyu into a "Music Island of the Orient" which can live up to its name.

    Zheng Xiaoying - Before assuming responsibility as Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Xiamen Philharmoinic Orchestra,Professor Zheng Xiaoying was Principal Condutor of China's Central Opera Theater and Dean of the Department of Conducting of China's Central Conservatory of Music.She was the founder and music director of "Ai Yue Nu",the Women's Philharmonic Chamber Crchestra,which was expanded into the first women's symphony orchestra in China and performed for the opening of the United Nations Fourth World on Women in 1955.She graduated from the Central Conservatiory of music,and continued for advanced studies in opera and symphonic conducting at the National Tchaikovsky Conservatory of Music in Moscow. She won first prize for excellent conducting from China's Ministry of Culture and also received the French Literature and Arts Medal of Honor.She often conducts for important state occasions,and has conducted more than 1000 opera performances and symphonic concerts at home and abroad.She is one of China's most experienced conductiong professors and is a passionate social activist for music.She has used various ways to introduce knowledge of music to audiences,whose members by now have numbered into the hundreds of thousands.She has won numerous national awards for he hard work and continuing contributions to music and to China's development.In 1998,she was invited to establish an orchestra run by non-government organizations in Xiamen and has promoted it to attain high levels of achievement in an unusually short time.

    Since 1980,Zheng Xiaoying has held concerts and conducted operas to wide acclaim in 'Australia, the United States,Italy,Russia,England,Finland,Germany,France,Belgium,the Netherlands,Sweden, Estonia,Singapore,Thailand,Japan,Hongkong,Macau and Taiwan.She was the first Chinese conductor to take the podium in a foreign opera theater,and Western news media have called her the world's best woman conductor.