Wang Xi-lin

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Wang Xi-lin, 2011

Wang Xi-lin ( Chinese  王 西 麟 , Pinyin Wáng Xī-lín , W.-G. Wang Hsi-lin ; born December 13, 1936 in Kaifeng , Henan Province , Republic of China ) is a Chinese composer .

Life

His family moved to Pingliang, Gansu Province . There Wang Xi-lin received music and harmonium lessons at a Christian mission school. After the early death of his father in 1948 and due to the poverty of his family, he joined an artist group of the People's Liberation Army at the age of 12 . There he learned to play the accordion , the violin huqin and brass instruments, but also acquired knowledge in the areas of music theory and instrumentation . From 1955 he studied conducting at the Central Military Music School in Beijing . In 1957 he moved to the Shanghai Music Academy , where he studied conducting and composition with Liu Zhuang (1932–2011), Qu Wei (1917–2002), Chen Mingzhi and Ding Shan-de . At the end of 1962 he composed the first movement of his 1st symphony as a thesis , which was not premiered until 1999. Wang Xi-lin became composer in residence with the Beijing Central Radio Symphony Orchestra . In 1963 he wrote the Yunnan Tone Poem - the final movement of this work, Torch Festival , became one of his most popular compositions and has been performed in more than 20 countries around the world.

In 1964 he criticized the government's cultural policy and got caught in the crossfire of the state campaign against Western art. He was released in 1964 and exiled to Shanxi Province for 14 years , where he served as a slave laborer for the Yanbei Art Troupe in Datong and was persecuted, tortured and temporarily detained during the Cultural Revolution . As a result of the abuse, he lost 20 percent of his hearing. From 1971 his situation improved again, he was able to work as a conductor again and became a composer for the Southeast Song and Dance Ensemble in Changzhi . Here he dealt with local folk music and wrote Shajiabang (1974), a work in the style of the Shangdang Bangzi opera . To avoid further difficulties, he also wrote works that were friendly to the regime, such as the choir Falling of the Giant Star - in Memory of Chairman Mao (1977). In 1978 he returned to Beijing after rehabilitation and became a full-time composer for the Beijing Song and Dance Troupe . In 1994 he traveled to the USA with the support of the Asian Cultural Council (ACC) and gave lectures at eight music academies, including a. also at the Yale School of Music. In China, Wang Xi-lin continued to work as composer in residence with the Beijing Symphony Orchestra .

Create

The early works of the 1960s are still committed to tonality and are composed in the style of Romanticism . Only after the years of exile was Wang Xi-lin able to deal again with the music of the European avant-garde, which had previously been ostracized in China, especially with Arnold Schönberg , Béla Bartók , Igor Stravinsky and Krzysztof Penderecki , but also with Alfred Schnittke , Witold Lutosławski and John Adams . In his compositions he took up elements of serialism , minimal music and cluster technology. Two other influences on his music became apparent: the Soviet music, especially by Dmitri Shostakovich , to whom he dedicated individual works, and Chinese folk music .

Wang Xi-lin wrote around 60 works, including chamber and vocal music, but also around 40 pieces for film and television. The main focus of his work, however, is on orchestral music, he composed ten symphonies , numerous symphonic suites , cantatas , overtures and concerts . His music is often characterized by a melancholy and tragic tone; it reflects his traumatic experiences from the time of exile, but also the wars and conflicts of Chinese history in the 20th century, which is why he is sometimes referred to as "China's Shostakovich". The 3rd symphony in particular is regarded as a “serious meditation” on the time of the Cultural Revolution.

In China, the performances of his 3rd symphony (1991) and his completed 1st symphony (1999) are among his successes. The premiere of his 4th symphony , which was planned for 2000 , was suspended because he had expressed himself critical of communism ; the performance did not take place until 2005. His works were u. a. listed in the United States, Australia, Germany, France, and Switzerland. He also wrote commissioned works for European ensembles, for example for the Cologne Chamber Orchestra and the Swiss Ensemble Antipodes . His 6th symphony , which he composed for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing , brought him another success . In 2010 his piano concert premiered in Switzerland. In 2015, his large-scale 9th Symphony was premiered in Beijing under Tang Muhai , its title is Requiem for the War of Chinese People's Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the World's Anti-Fascist War . In 2019 celebrated its 10th symphony , written for the 35th birthday of the Macau Orchestra .

Awards

Wang Xi-lin received the highest state award in 1981 for his Yunnan Tone Poem , in 2000 for his song Spring Rain and in 2004 for Three Symphonic Frescoes - Legend of Sea .

Others

His daughter Wang Ying (* 1976) also became a composer.

literature

  • Hon-Lun Yang:  Wang Xilin. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 17 (Vina - Zykan). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2007, ISBN 978-3-7618-1137-5  ( online edition , subscription required for full access)
  • Jincheng Huang: Wang Xilin - Chinese Shostakovich. Research in Wang Xilin's Musical Life and Musical Achievements . In: Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research . Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Arts, Design and Contemporary Education (ICADCE 2017). tape 144 . Atlantis Press, 2017, ISBN 978-94-6252-368-5 , ISSN  2352-5398 , pp. 159–164 , doi : 10.2991 / icadce-17.2017.36 (English, atlantis-press.com [PDF; accessed on November 14, 2019]).
  • Liu Ching-chih: Wang Xilin . In: A Critical History of New Music in China . The Chinese University Press, Hong Kong 2010, ISBN 978-962-996-360-6 , pp. 640 (English, full text in Google Book Search [accessed November 14, 2019]).
  • At Peng: Where am I at home? An interview with the Chinese composer Xilin Wang . In: New magazine for music . No. 3 , 2020, ISSN  0945-6945 , p. 54-57 .

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ The sources give different dates of birth. Schott Music and sin80 mention December 13, 1936, October 30, 1936 can be found at MGG. Other sources such as LCCN and Classicalarchives give 1937 as the year of birth.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Hon-Lun Yang:  Wang Xilin. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 17 (Vina - Zykan). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2007, ISBN 978-3-7618-1137-5  ( online edition , subscription required for full access)
  2. ↑ a b c d Xilin Wang , profile at Schott Music
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l Xi-lin Wang on: classicalarchives (English)
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g Wang Xi-lin in: sin80 (English)
  5. ↑ a b c Jincheng Huang: Wang Xilin - Chinese Shostakovich. Research in Wang Xilin's Musical Life and Musical Achievements . In: Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research . Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Arts, Design and Contemporary Education (ICADCE 2017). tape 144 . Atlantis Press, 2017, ISBN 978-94-6252-368-5 , ISSN  2352-5398 , pp. 159–164 , doi : 10.2991 / icadce-17.2017.36 (English, atlantis-press.com [PDF; accessed on November 14, 2019]).
  6. ↑ a b Wang Xi-Lin on: douban (English)
  7. ↑ a b c d Wang Xilin's Music Style in: douban (English)
  8. ↑ Xilin Wang on: musiktage-am-rhein (English)
  9. ↑ 5 Chinese composers you should know in: timeoutbeijing (English)
  10. ↑ Hon-Lun Yang: A Symphony To Reflect On The Path of Communism . In: Patricia Hall (Ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Music Censorship . Oxford University Press, New York 2018, ISBN 978-0-19-973316-3 , pp. 463 (English, 713 pages, full text in the Google Book Search [accessed October 29, 2019]).
  11. ↑ Didi Kirsten Tatlow: A Wordless Elegy for China's War Dead. In: The New York Times . December 11, 2015, accessed November 13, 2019 .
  12. ↑ 10th Symphony on: om.macau (English)
Note: This article places the family name before the person's first name. This is the usual order in Chinese. Wang is the family name here, Xi-lin is the first name.
personal data
SURNAME Wang, Xi-lin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Chinese composer
DATE OF BIRTH December 13, 1936
PLACE OF BIRTH Kaifeng , Henan