Jimu news reporter Di Xin
Correspondent Zhu Changping Chen Ying
A Hanfu, a guzheng, an ancient girl plucking the strings, the long and long "Big Fish" played in the streets of France, attracting everyone to stop and listen...
This is a scene on November 6 in the square of the Grand Theater in Bordeaux, France, where a guzheng girl named Peng Jingxuan in the center of the crowd is 26 years old and graduated from the Chinese Instrumental Music Department of the Wuhan Conservatory of Music. Now studying at the Bordeaux Conservatory of Music in France, she has played guzheng on foreign streets for four consecutive years and made videos, gaining nearly 10 million domestic and foreign fans on YouTube, Instagram, Douyin and other websites. Musicians in Sweden, the United States, Japan and other places took the initiative to throw an olive branch after watching her performance videos and invited her to participate in music creation.
Foreign children line up to feel the guzheng
"Every time you perform a guzheng on the street, it is not improvised, but carefully prepared." Peng Jingxuan told reporters that before each performance, she would design the repertoire half a month in advance: the classic song "Mountain Flowing Water", "Fishing Boat Singing Evening", "Horse Racing", the film and television interlude "Boy When Self-Reliance", "Sword Like a Dream", the popular song "Compendium of Materia Medica", "Dragon Fist", "Blue and White Porcelain", "Dalabang Bar", and even the "Fighting Landlord" game sound adaptation of the song are all on her performance list. "I will intersperse the songs of different eras and styles to perform, and show the unique instrumental attributes of the techniques of portamento, pressing and kneading when playing, so that foreign audiences can feel the diversity and change of the guzheng as much as possible."
Although she has accumulated a wealth of performance experience in China, Peng Jingxuan was still very nervous when she performed on the streets of France for the first time in 2018, but she believed in the charm of traditional Chinese instruments and hoped to take this opportunity to introduce her music skills to the world that she had painstakingly learned for many years. A fully devoted "Blue and White Porcelain" played, and many tourists stopped their hurried steps and gathered around the piano to listen. Then Peng Jingxuan played seven or eight pieces of music in a row, more and more people stopped to watch, and the "freshness" in the eyes of passers-by slowly became "appreciation", and they also took out their mobile phones to take photos with Peng Jingxuan.
Once after a song was played, Peng Jingxuan found seven or eight children sitting on the ground, sitting upright in front of the guzheng, and said to her: "You are so beautiful, your instrument is also very beautiful, what is the name" Peng Jingxuan taught them to read "Guzheng" over and over again, and also beckoned the children to line up to touch the piano frame, pluck the strings, and feel the pronunciation of Chinese classical instruments. "Now when I perform, I occasionally hear a child say to his little friend in French, 'This is called guzheng, Chinese', and I feel very proud inside."
Now when Peng Jingxuan plays, she will put up a small sign next to her, which writes the pinyin of the guzheng, and she also prints a French propaganda brochure about the guzheng herself, and uses the performance to promote traditional Chinese instruments to people.
Lang Lang encouraged her to spread ethnic music
Peng Jingxuan has maintained the habit of performing street performances every two weeks, and gradually has his own fans in the local area. At the end of one performance, an old French couple who listened to the whole performance took the initiative to come forward to greet them, "They held my hand and thanked me for bringing Chinese music to them." They also said that they hope to have time to go to China to see and feel the scenery and water in the music. ”
In the past two years, Peng Jingxuan used the winter and summer vacation time to plan the action of "traveling with the guzheng", playing all the way, playing all the way, walking through more than ten cities in southwest France, sometimes strange tourists will come forward to ask which country's musical instrument, often people mistakenly recognize the guzheng as a Korean and Japanese instrument, which makes Peng Jingxuan's heart very unhappy, so she began to wear Hanfu and qipao on the street to play. "I did a lot of homework to understand Hanfu, and also ordered more than 10 sets of Hanfu from China to send to Bordeaux, and spent more than 2 hours preparing a dress before the performance. This is done in the hope that when performing abroad, it will leave a deeper national imprint on the guzheng. ”
Although it is very hard to play the guzheng everywhere in this way, Peng Jingxuan's heart is sweet, and she feels that all her efforts are worth it. Peng Jingxuan and her classmates together, the street performance into a video, put on the domestic and foreign social media sites, attracted nearly 10 million Chinese and foreign fans, People's Daily, the Communist Youth League Central Committee and other media V have reprinted her video, she was also invited by CCTV, Zhejiang Satellite TV to return to China to participate in the performance. During a rehearsal of the show, Peng Jingxuan met the pianist Lang Lang, who not only recognized her but also cheered her up. "Teacher Lang Lang said, you are really good, come on and continue to pass on the traditional Chinese culture." Peng Jingxuan, who has received recognition and encouragement, is very excited, and she also dreams of one day, she can also perform on the international stage like her predecessors, becoming a bridge between Chinese and Western music exchanges.
Hope to become a bridge between Chinese and Western music
When she was a child, Peng Jingxuan liked to watch costume dramas and was obsessed with the elegant temperament of the women playing musical instruments in the play, so she chose guzheng at the age of 7. When she grew up, Peng Jingxuan was admitted to the Chinese Music Department of the Wuhan Conservatory of Music, where she was also exposed to a variety of traditional instruments such as cers, chimes, and chimes. "When I was a child, I felt that practicing was boring and tedious, and the more instruments I came into contact with after college, the more I could feel the profundity of traditional music, and I chose to study abroad, hoping to broaden my horizons and be eclectic."
During her study abroad in France, Peng Jingxuan met musicians from all over the world, who improvised on the streets and collided with wonderful musical sparks. In Nice, she met a pianist named Steve, and after groping, the two sides could even play good music together; at the Avignon Theater Festival, she met a guitar girl and a singer from Italy, who formed a temporary band to perform in the streets; she also played "My Motherland and Me" under the Eiffel Tower with the French erhu player Kokang... "These experiences made me re-acquaint myself with guzheng, it turns out that everything can be guzheng, and the fusion between music is so wonderful!" Peng Jingxuan sighed.
This summer, at the invitation of Swiss composer Nicola, Peng Jingxuan participated in the recording of a Chinese-style music album, and next year they plan to participate in a concert in Switzerland to let more European friends know about Chinese classical instruments. "I hope to have special concerts everywhere after graduation and continue to show chinese instruments to the world!" I also hope to do my best to integrate excellent Western music with Chinese music and promote music exchanges between the East and the West. Peng Jingxuan said.
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