“A Night of Chinese Music” held at 7:30 p.m. October 3, 2015 in Reynolds Performance Hall at UCA turned out to be a very successful cultural event.
This concert was cosponsored by Confucius Institute Headquarters, UCA Confucius Institute, and Nanjing University Traditional Instruments Orchestra. It was part of the orchestra’s music tour in America. This music feast not only attracted faculty, staff and students from UCA, but also residents from Conway and Little Rock.
The opening ensemble “Jasmine Flower” brought the audience into the world of Chinese music with its beautiful melody.
It was followed by a Gu Zheng solo “An Early Spring Morning on a Snowy Mountain”, Erhu solo “Birdsong Heard in an Empty Mountain”, ensemble “Wonderful Jiangnan” , and “Lantern Bazaar along Qinhuai River”.
When the American song “Yankee Doodle” was played on the traditional instruments, the audience pleasantly clapped their hands along with the music.
The concert ended with “Blooming Flowers and a Full Moon”.
This concert not only entertained the audience with different forms of music playing, but also with other Chinese cultural elements like calligraphy, Chinese painting and Taiji performance.
The orchestra received a long standing ovation at the end of the concert. One of the audiences asked UCA Confucius Institute staff to teach her how to say “Your performance is fabulous” in Chinese so that she could express her appreciation to the orchestra.
It has been invited to give performance in America, Britain, Germany, Canada, Russia and Japan many times.
Performance at UCA was one of seven stops of their American tour, including New Orleans, Dallas, Houston, and Memphis.