Greetings from Artistic Director Welcome to our performance this evening! We’re so thrilled to be able to present these amazing works to you, and to introduce Professor Ye Xiaogang and his brilliant music to Portland audiences for the first time. We are indebted to Bruce Guenther, Tina Olson, and everyone at the Portland Art Museum who helped make it possible to present this program tonight. Third Angle’s China ‘journey’ began in 2001, when I came across an article in the New York Times describing the first class of graduates from the Beijing Conservatory, post-Cultural Revolution. The stories of Chen Yi, Jia Daqun, and Ye Xiaogang were incredibly moving, great testaments of total commitment to art. Over the following years, Third Angle has brought Chen Yi to Portland twice, and recently released a critically acclaimed recording of her chamber music on New World Records. The music on tonight’s program draws on centuries of Chinese culture, from Sichuan opera to gorgeous evocations of nature, combining western and Chinese instruments to create what we think is a beautiful musical complement to the China Design Now exhibit. And I’m so pleased that my good friend and symphony colleague Daniel Feng is performing with us tonight, as well as the brilliant zheng virtuoso Haiqiong Deng We invite you to take note of the remaining concerts on our season, and thank you again for joining us this evening. Sincerely, Ron Blessinger Artistic Director Third Angle Ensemble Guest biographies Haiqiong Deng, zheng Haiqiong Deng was the winner of the Outstanding Performance Prize at the Chinese National Zheng Competition in Shanghai. She made her professional début in Beijing in 1997. Since that time she has developed an international reputation as zheng soloist and chamber musician with numerous performances throughout China, Japan, Singapore and the United States. Her instrument, the zheng, is a 21 or 26- string plucked instrument with moveable bridges for each string, and is the ancestor of the Japanese koto and Korean kayagum. Since 2001 she has performed at music festivals and lecturing and performing at various universities, museums, and conferences across the entire United States. Her Carnegie Hall début recital in 2003 included two world premieres: Dots, Lines, Convergence by Chihchun Chi-sun Lee, Concerto for zheng and chamber ensemble commissioned by the Harvard Fromm Foundation, and CRUSH, a duo for zheng and soprano saxophone by Michael Sidney Timpson. She has appeared as a soloist with the Tallahassee Symphony Orchestra, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, the Singapore Chinese Orchestra, and the Singapore City Orchestra. Recently, Haiqiong is extending her musical expressions within Indian classical music under the instruction of Indian sitarist, Nalini Vinayak. Haiqiong released her solo CD, Ning – Chinese Zheng Solo by Haiqiong Deng, in September 2002 on the Celebrity Music label. She also appeared as a soloist in Out of Tang Court by composer Zhou Long on Evelyn Glennie’s CD, Oriental Landscapes, with the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, and Tales From the Cave, with Music from China. Haiqiong received her Bachelor of music degree in zheng performance from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and Master of Arts in Arts Administration and Ethnomusicology from the Florida State University College of Music. She is currently the Director of the Chinese Music Ensemble at the Florida State University. Raven Frolic in Wintry Water (traditional zheng solo) This is a well-known traditional piece in Chao-zhou guzheng school. The tune originated from Chaozhou xianshi music. By using various left-hand bending techniques, the music pictures a lively and beautiful scene in nature. Daniel Feng, violinist Daniel Feng has lived in the USA for 20 years. He was originally from China and started studying the violin with his father, a Hubei Province Opera Orchestra violinist, at age 5. After graduating from Wuhan Conservatory, he was sent to the Guiling Singing and Dancing Department to work. At the age of 24, he won a scholarship from Loma Linda University and came to the USA to pursue his studies, also playing with the Pacific Symphony and various other southern California orchestras at the same time. Feng subbed for the Los Angeles Philharmonic and participated in recordings for the movie industry as well. A 14-year member of the Oregon Symphony, Feng played the Vivaldi Summer Concerto with the orchestra in 2002 and has also taken part in various local musical festivals. Ye Xiaogang, composer (Beijing) Regarded as one of the most leading and influential composers in China, Xiaogang Ye is also a Standing member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Vice Chairman of China's Musicians' Association, Vice President of the Central Conservatory of Music, Founder-Music director of the Ensemble Eclipse, and Artistic director of Beijing Modern Music Festival. Born in a musical family, Ye learned piano at the age of four, and was transferred to work in the countryside after graduating from high school during the Cultural Revolution. After finishing his 6 years of bench work in a factory, he was enrolled into the Central Conservatory of Music and studied composition with Prof. Du Mingxin. Ye studied in Prof. Alexander Goehr's class in 1980, and he received a full scholarship from the Eastman School of Music in U.S. in 1987 to further his studies in composition with Dr. Samuel Adler, Dr. Joseph Schwantner and Prof. Louis Andriesen. Since 1983, Ye has received numerous national and international awards, commissions, and has participated in many international artistic activities, including 5 Dance Dramas (Dalai VI, The Snow is Red, When the Dream Fades, Shenzhen Story, Macao Bride); Chamber Music (Threnody, Ballade, Marginalia, Nine Run, Nine Horses, Enchanted Bamboo, Woody Spring, Lotus Flower, Eight Horses); orchestral works (The Last Paradise, The Silence of the Sakyamuni, The Silence of the Red Poppy, The Far Calls, Pipa Concerto, Great Wall Symphony, Horizon, Spring, Grand Theater Overture, Twilight in Tibet, The Scent of Green Mangoo, Winter III, Symphony No.3 Chu, Moon Over the West River, Winter). These works were premiered in Canada, U. S. A., Japan, New Zealand, Finland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau regions. His awards include the 20th Century Chinese Music Master Piece Grand prize in the 1st Orchestral Composition Competition presented by the Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, the first prize in the Alexander Tcherepnin Composition Competition, the Louis Lane Prize and Howard Hanson Prize from the Eastman School of music, the Heritage Prize for Excellence in Creative Activity in Music from the LI Foundation of San Francisco, Best Movie Music Award of Shanghai, National Best Score for Film, National Golden Bell Award for Symphony and Chamber Music, Commission grant from the Council of Pennsylvania State of America and the Great Capital Life Fund Committee, Five-One-Project Award by Publicity Department of China Central Committee and the Wenhua Award by China Ministry of Culture. Ye has also composed for over 30 films, including Showers, A Girl from Hunan, Life Song, Out of Triumphal Arch, Evening Liaison, Eighteen Spring, The Treatment, The End of the Bridge, and Jade Goddess of Mercy. Musical America considered Xiaogang Ye as one of the "Chinese Bachs" and reviewed that his music displays boldly defined musical personalities, vividly expressed. It is to be hoped that the daunting political and geographic obstacles separating this composer from the world musical community wiil not prevent him from achieving the international reputation he deserves. John Corigliano, a well- known American composer, acclaimed that "his music is deeply felt and highly crafted, so beautiful and yet always intellectually stimulating, completely magical - so amazing." Since 1995, his musical works have been published by Schott Music International, GmbH in Germany. San Die by Ye Xiaogang (1987) Flute, zheng In 1987, San Die, originally composed for shakuhachi and koto, was premiered in Tokyo, which was commissioned by Kifu Mitsuhashi , the renowned Japanese shakuhachi player. In 2007, a new version for flute and zheng of this composition was premiered in Beijing by Fan Ran , a Chinese zheng player . The work shows a combination of timbres of eastern and western instruments, among which the zheng embodies the eastern style of ease and comfortableness, while the flute reflects sadness and tension of the inner heart. The composer tries to explore the timber combination of the Chinese traditional instrument and the typical western instrument by means of this duet version. Colorful Sutra Banner by Ye Xiaogang (2006) Violin, cello, piano The music of "Colorful Sutra Banner" is the recollection of the composer's journey to the Tibetan Plateau. The fluttering Colorful Sutra Banners are viewed as the most sacred symbol to the Tibetans, and they make the most beautiful scenery of Tibetan landscape and mindscape. Datura by Ye Xiaogang (2006) Flute, violin, cello, piano Datura was commissioned by Accessible Contemporary Music and was written in a unique way. I composed the piece in installments over the summer of 2006 and emailed them to the players in Chicago as each section was completed. In this unique way of working I was able to have time between each installment to think about what would come next and to get feedback from the performers about the music. This is a very new and different way for a composer to work. Usually I write the piece in solitude and then hand it to the performers but writing in installments allows more communications between the performers and the composer and allows the audience to hear the piece as it’s created. The datura is a very common houseplant in south China and very beautiful, but it can also be used as a hallucinogen, usually with unpleasant results. In this piece, I juxtaposed the beauty of the plant with the intense inner world it can create by using alternately tranquil and intense musical passages.