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Dressed stylishly, with a light touch of make-up, Ma Xianghua, 25, presents a pleasing picture of youthful vitality. It is hard to relate such a sprightly and fashionable young woman with the erhu, a two-stringed Chinese traditional instrument, known for its melancholy tone.
But for Ma, playing the erhu is the perfect way for her to express her feelings.
This Saturday evening, she will give a solo concert at the Beijing Concert Hall to mark her graduation from the Central Conservatory of Music, where she was engaged in postgraduate studies.
Born to a working family in Ji'nan in East China's Shandong Province, Ma's love for the instrument goes back a long way.
Ma's father, a worker who had a passion for the erhu, sent her to study the instrument at the Children's Palace in Ji'nan when she was only 5 years old.
At first, the vivacious little girl showed little interest in the ancient traditional instrument.
"I preferred singing and dancing at that time. Playing erhu was boring for a lively girl like me," Ma said.
Though she did not take the instrument seriously, she won first prize at an erhu competition for children in her hometown the very next year.
"Perhaps that first prize pricked the vanity of a little girl like me and from then on I gradually became interested in playing the erhu," Ma recalled.
Then she started taking lessons with Su An'guo, a well-known erhu soloist in Shandong Province.
From that time on, while other children played outside in the alleyways, Ma would play the erhu at home or in the practice room in the Children's Palace.
Every day after finishing her homework, she would practise for several hours, never feeling it to be a chore.
"The erhu was my toy. I did not feel lonely playing it by myself. Whenever I sat down and started to play, I became calm immediately, no matter how mischievous I might have been at other times," Ma said.
As she got better and better, and began to enjoy some fame as a young erhu player in her hometown, her teachers and her father all hoped that Ma could get formal training in a music school to refine her skills.
Therefore, in 1986, her father took her to Beijing to take part in the entrance examination for the Primary School Attached to the Central Conservatory of Music.
"There were so many people, from all over the country. I was rather awestruck," Ma recalled.
But she did well in the examination nonetheless, and was one of the three students out of more than 50 applicants that were accepted by the school.
Three years later, she won first prize at the Art Cup Chinese Traditional Instruments Competition, in the erhu category.
In 1994, she was accepted by the Central Conservatory of Music, exempted from the entrance examinations.
She was such a talented and hardworking student that the conservatory recommended her for further study as a post-graduate student in 1998.
In addition to the erhu, she also studied other Chinese traditional instruments such as the gaohu and banhu to help her better appreciate the dramatically expressive tone of the erhu.
Ma also travelled to many cities, such as Shanghai, Guangzhou and Nanjing, to learn different playing styles from erhu masters around the country.
Though she has not turned professional, she has given a dozen concerts both at home and abroad and has won a number of competitions. Among them, the most important one to her is the first prize she took at Chinese Instrument Competition in Taipei in 1997.
"I went to Taipei to learn from others," said Ma, who thought she was too young to have any chance of winning anything.
To ensure the impartiality of the judges, the players performed behind a curtain.
After her unexpected win, Ma was so excited that she called her father in Ji'nan.
"My father could not believe what he heard, and asked me to repeat what I had said," Ma said, as excitedly as if she had just won the competition.
"When my father first sent me to study the erhu, he was not thinking of it as my career. He simply hoped to nurture my appreciation of music," said Ma.
"So you can imagine how happy my father was at that moment," she said.
Her success in this competition fortified her confidence in making the instrument her career, Ma said.
She also attributed her win to Liu Changfu with whom she has studied since 1991. Liu is a renowned erhu musician and the first master of the erhu at the conservatory.
She said Liu is an experienced teacher and that he always suits his instruction to the aptitude of his students.
For the competition in Taipei, Liu arranged different styles of playing for Ma and another of his students. The two won both first and second place in the competition.
Liu makes no bones about praising his favorite protege: "She is bright, talented and has amazingly good understanding of music."
Liu also says that a lively player's performance will usually sound impetuous while that of an introverted person will lack enthusiasm. But Ma, although she is such a young and lively player, can hold her emotions in balance and devote her heart to the music she is playing.
But although Ma's skill is remarkable for such a young player, she still has things to learn.
Her main problems at this point in her career are that her technique is too smooth and that she is lacking in life experience.
So in order to capture the traditional melancholy tone of the erhu, she has to rely on the rich experience of her teacher.
Ma says that whenever she is learning to play the repertoire composed by such late erhu masters as Sun Wenming, Hua Yanjun and Liu Tianhua, she first studies the background to the compositions.
She also realizes that a good erhu player should establish her own style. She said: "I have had several experienced teachers. But simply imitating them is not enough."
The repertoire for this Saturday's concert has been carefully selected by Ma and her professor.
The four pieces in the first part of the concert all demand superb playing skills.
In "Music of the Bamboo Flute in the Still of the Night (Jingye Xiaosheng), Ma uses the erhu to imitate the sounds of the vertical bamboo flute, another traditional Chinese instrument.
In addition, Ma will play a transposition of the famous violin piece "Caprice on a Theme of Carmen." The audience is sure to enjoy this complicated piece expressed so exquisitely on a two stringed instrument.
The second part of the programme includes two concertos for erhu, played with the symphony orchestra of the Chinese Opera and Dance Theatre.
One of them is Erhu Concerto No 1 composed by Guan Naizhong, a noted Chinese composer who now lives in Canada.
He was one of the judges at the competition in Taipei where Ma took first place. His concerto was one of the assigned pieces for the competition.
Guan thinks so highly of Ma's playing that he agreed to conduct the concert.
After graduating in June, she will teach alongside her professor.
Ma said, she prefers to study and teach at the conservatory rather than work as a professional soloist who has to give performances one after another.
"The positive atmosphere of the conservatory has been a great stimulation for me. I must say that I have been blessed with good luck," she said.
"I remain fascinated by the erhu and I feel that there are no limits to the magic of the instrument and what it has to teach me."
(China Daily 05/16/2001)
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