Beethoven in Beijing

Sinica Podcast

Kaiser Kuo

Culture, China News, Hangzhou, Chinese, International Relations, Chongqing, Beijing, Sichuan, Currentaffairs, China, Politics, Chengdu, Shanghai, Guangzhou, China Economy, News, China Politics, Business, Film, Shenzhen

4.8 • 676 Ratings

🗓️ 15 April 2021

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On April 16, PBS’s Great Performances will broadcast the world premiere of the documentary Beethoven in Beijing, which tells the story of classical music in China over the last half century through the lens of the Philadelphia Orchestra’s storied relationship with the country, from its first performances in the P.R.C. in 1973 until its most recent tour, in 2018. Along the way, the film profiles established Chinese musicians and composers, like Tán Dùn 谭盾 and Láng Lǎng 郎朗, and introduces us to new Chinese talent, like the composer Peng-Peng Gong 龚天鹏.

This week, Kaiser chats with three individuals involved with the film: co-director Jennifer Lin, a veteran Philadelphia Inquirer reporter and the author of the 2017 book Shanghai Faithful; producer Cài Jīndōng 蔡金冬, a professor of music and arts at Bard College, the director of the US-China Music Institute, and a former conductor of the Stanford Symphony Orchestra; and Sheila Melvin, a script consultant for Beethoven in Beijing and the co-author, along with her husband, Cai, of Rhapsody in Red and Beethoven in China, both books about classical music in the People’s Republic of China.

Recommendations:

Sheila: This viola concerto, performed by the Shanghai Philharmonic.

Jindong: The works of Zhōu Lóng 周龙.

Kaiser: A day in the life of Abed Salama, by Nathan Thrall, and Surviving the crackdown in Xinjiang, by Raffi Khatchadourian.

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Transcript

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0:40.8	Start your free 30-day trial at audible.com slash Wondery UK.
0:45.7	That's audible.com slash Wondery UK. Welcome to the Cynica podcast, a weekly discussion of current affairs in China, produced in partnership with SubChina.
1:04.4	SubChina is the best way to keep on top of all the news out of China, especially if you subscribe to our email newsletter, SubChina Access, or check
1:12.5	out SubChina.com for all the original reported stories, op-eds, great regular columns, and
1:18.0	our growing range of videos and podcasts. It's a feast of business, political, and cultural news about
1:23.9	a nation that is reshaping the world. I'm Kaiser Guo coming to you today from my home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
1:31.0	I've not made any secret of the fact that it's been pretty rough for me of late,
1:35.2	what with U.S.-China tensions continuing to rise,
1:37.8	even after the election of Joe Biden and, you know, with anti-Asian hate,
1:41.7	inseparable really from the synophobia that's gripped so much to the country.
1:46.0	I imagine that many of the listeners to this show share my despondency.
1:51.0	Well, folks, I've got something that might just make you feel better, at least for 90 minutes,
1:55.6	with a warm afterglow that will keep your mood elevated for that long again, at least.
	...

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