Debra Li

debra_lidan@163.com

MORE than 500 people enjoyed a concert performed by young musicians from Shenzhen and Hong Kong on Nov. 8 in Hong Kong.

The event, held at the Regala Skycity Hotel, Lantau Island marked the 26th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to the motherland, and aimed to foster a closer bond between young people across the Shenzhen River.

Emceed by pianist Lai Peilin, a member of the Nanshan Musicians Association (NMA), the concert featured vocals, Chinese instruments and dances.

Opening the show was an ethnic Dai dance presented by a team from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, aptly titled “South of the Colorful Clouds,” as the ethnic Dai people in China live in Yunnan Province, known as a place “south of the clouds.”

A city where the East meets the West, Hong Kong has cherished the traditions of Chinese culture, arts and customs, with quite a few Chinese orchestras and many talented musicians dedicated to Chinese instruments.

Zeng Qiujian, a Hong Kong-based erhu player trained in the Xinghai Conservatory of Music in Guangzhou and Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, performed “The Shepherd of the Cocoto Sea” and his own adapted version of “Horseracing,” adding a contemporary touch to traditional erhu music to woo the young audience.

Wen Xiaoting from Shenzhen performed on the zheng (Chinese plucked board zither) such familiar tunes as “Evening Tunes on a Fishing Boat” and “Liuyang River.”

Baritone Ding Jie from Shenzhen University, Hong Kong-based tenor Chen Yu, and singers Zhao Yuanyuan and Katherine Lau also performed vocals, bringing familiar tunes such as “You Raise Me Up” and Lo Ta-yu’s “Pearl of the Orient,” a song written for Hong Kong.

The show-stopping moment was contributed by Li Yuanqing, a Shenzhen artist who has revived the intangible cultural heritage of performing music on a saw’s edge.

The saw is played seated, with the handle squeezed between the legs, and the far end held with one hand. The sound is created by drawing a bow across the back edge of the saw at the center of the S-curve.

When the sawist made unique soft tunes of “Sweet” and “Morning of the Miao Mountain” from his seemingly impossible instrument, the audience was first amazed and then responded by giving him thunderous applause.

Also performing at the concert were the NMA Wind Ensemble, soprano Liu Lilin, and three choruses from the two cities conducted by Xian Yiming, a young musician and teacher from Shenzhen University.

The concert was the latest in a series of exchanges initiated by NMA and Nanshan Federation of Literary and Art Circles in 2020. Thus far, Chinese music concerts, opera salons and online singing festivals have been organized to foster closer bonds between musicians in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.