Tuesday is Tour Day with Anthea Jackson, MYO Executive Director and China Tour Chaperone This is me on the Great Wall of China in May, 1986. I was in grade 10 and was lucky enough to tour China with my high school orchestra. We toured Shanghai, Beijing, Nanjing, and Suzhou and performed everywhere we went. I remember being amazed by the technical mastery and musicianship of very young students at the Beijing Conservatory. We met with them after the shared performance and exchanged gifts over ice cream. I still have the red silk scarf from a talented young pianist I met there. I wonder if he still has my Canadian maple leaf pin. We played exciting repertoire that included Stravinsky Firebird, Elgar Enigma Variations (the Nimrod variation still makes me cry), Shostakovich Festive Overture, and a Pipa Concerto that was my first introduction to this unique Chinese string instrument. The brass and percussion used to open every concert with Copland’s Fanfare to the Common Man while the rest of us sat onstage waiting for our turn. It was awe inspiring to be in the middle of that huge sound! I saw so many wonderful sights it’s hard to know where to start (or stop!). Walking up and down the Great Wall of China was incredible! Paddling a boat in the Forbidden City with my best friend Monica, seeing the silk-making process firsthand from cocoon to silk robes, marveling over park squares filled with people doing T’ai Chi first thing in the morning, walking into Mao Zedong’s tomb in the hushed stillness… How much has changed since that time?? The city landscapes will be so different, but I think we will be welcomed just as warmly as we were back then. I’ll be bringing my MYO pins and will look forward to exchanging music, keepsakes, and memories.
Posted on: Tue, 18 Mar 2014 20:30:25 +0000
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