Chinese guzheng
Orlando, Florida
Photo: Li Wei
Guzheng master Ann Yao embodies China’s musical past and present with elegance and grace, deftly performing cutting-edge interpretations of traditional material on one of China’s most ancient instruments. A Shanghai native, Ann brings a deep knowledge of Chinese traditional music and a profound expressivity to the guzheng, a five-foot long, horizontal, plucked zither typically featuring 21 strings. As an artist, educator, and ambassador for an instrument central to so many music traditions throughout China, Ann enthralls new audiences with the lush, evocative sound of the guzheng, bringing traditional Chinese string music to new heights of skill and beauty.
The earliest known reference to a guzheng appears in Chinese literature in the third century BCE. In Chinese tradition, instruments are classified into groups according to the materials used in their construction. Like other string instruments, the guzheng is considered a “silk” instrument—though now made of metal and nylon, in ancient times, the strings were made of silk. As Chinese music was increasingly influenced by Western music in the second half of the 20th century, traditional instruments, including silk instruments like the guzheng, were taught in conservatory settings, with a greater emphasis placed on virtuosity and solo concert performances.
Raised by her grandparents, Ann Yao was born into a musical family that immersed her in a wide range of Chinese music traditions. She was deeply influenced by her grandfather, a well-known multi-instrumentalist, and by a revolving cast of musicians from throughout China who gathered at her grandparents’ home, an important hub for traditional artists in Shanghai. By witnessing, absorbing, and participating in diverse music-making sessions at home throughout her youth, Ann became familiar with a wide variety of regional traditional, folk and theatrical music. Originally a student of the pipa, a four-stringed lute, she began learning the guzheng at 10 years old from her aunt and uncle, eventually studying the instrument at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. There, she followed in her aunt’s footsteps joining the third generation of an ensemble that represented an emerging silk quintet tradition. The quintet featured only silk, or string, instruments: the guzheng, pipa, erhu (two-string fiddle), yangqin (hammered dulcimer), and liuqin (a small, high-pitched lute). Upon graduation, she joined Beijing’s Central National Music Ensemble.
After moving to the United States in the 1980s, she joined Music from China, an innovative, New York City-based ensemble known for contemporary arrangements of traditional material. Since settling in Orlando, Ann has received the prestigious Florida Folk Heritage Award, recognizing her outstanding stewardship of one of Florida's living traditions. She continues to perform with Music from China as well as other special collaborations, and has appeared at such venues as the Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Library of Congress, and the Kennedy Center. For this special virtual event, Ann will perform an intimate concert of a broad range of Chinese folk and traditional melodies, showcasing her virtuosity as a soloist and the sublime beauty of the guzheng.