Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra

Yan Huichang
Conductor/Host

Yan Huichang was conferred the title of National Class One Conductor at the First Professional Appraisal of China in 1987. He was appointed Music Director of the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra in June 1997 and was re-titled Artistic Director and Principal Conductor in October 2003. as a conductor, he has worked with all professional Chinese orchestras in Beijing, Shanghai, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong. In collaboration with renowned directors Zhang Yimou, Teng Wenji, the famous composer Zhao Jiping and the Symphony Orchestra section of the Central Philharmonic Orchestra of China, Yan had made soundtrack recordings for such award winning films as Raise the Red Lantern, Ballad of Yellow River, and Five Girls and a Rope.
Yan is actively engaged in composition. His representative works include the symphonic poem The Sound of Water which won a Class One Prize in the Composition Contest of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and Class Two Prize in the Third National Music Composition Competition; and the pipa solo work Nostalgia which won a Class One Award at the First National Pipa Contest of Contributing Works. Yan was awarded the "Cultural Medallion (Music)" by the National Arts Council of Singapore in September 2001.

Gong Lin
Conductor

Gong Lin received his Master's degree from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music in 1989. He went to Japan to further his studies in 1992, and was awarded a doctoral degree in 1997. He formed the Japan Chinese Orchestra in the same year, with himself serving as Artistic Director and Conductor.
In 1999, he founded the Huaxia Conservatory of Music in Japan, with himself as President. In 2001 he formed the Orient Philharmonic Orchestra, with himself as Artistic Director and Conductor. Gong has been a contributing force to eastern music, particularly in popularizing Chinese music on the international scene.

Chen Yiqian
Xiaoruan

Guo Yazhi / Suona

Chen Yiqian is currently a full-time lecturer in the Chinese Music Department of the Tainan National College of the Arts, a part-time lecturer in the Chinese Music Department of the Chinese Culture University and a principal of the Taipei Liuqin Chamber Orchestra.
Chen recorded The Courtyard After the Rain in 2001 with the Central Folk Orchestra of Beijing, under the baton of Mr Su Wenqing. It was included in the album, The Swallow, released under the Shangyang label. In March 2003, she gave a solo recital on the liuqin at the National Concert Hall of Taipei in 2003.

Yuen Shi-chun
Runaxian

Currently the Research Development Officer (Musical Instrument). Yuen joined the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra in 1974.
For the past three decades, Yuen has consistently worked on the improvement and design of plucked instruments. In 1992 and 1996 Yuen won the "Technology Advancement Award" from the Chinese Ministry of Culture for his liuqin and ruanxian respectively. In 1998, he was given the same award for the consort of ruanxian he made. In 1993, Yuen was appointed a member of the "Experts of Chinese Musical Instrument Improvement". In 2003, he received the Award for Arts Achievement by the Hong Kong Arts Development.

Aiichi Oki
Gehu

Aiichi Oki is a soloist with the Japan Chinese Orchestra. Currently a professor at the Osaka Kyoiku University, he is an active performer and educationist on the Japanese music scene today.
Oki graduated from the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music with outstanding results in 1980, where he was trained by Ken Abo, Shuya Matsushita and Yasushi Horie. Between 1988 and 1989, in the capacity of an overseas researcher under the Ministry of Education of Japan, he furthered his studies in Hungary on a Hungarian Government Grant.

Gao Yang
Erhu

Gao Yang is a member of the Chinese Musicians’ Association, Executive Director of the Erhu Society of China, Executive Director and Deputy Secretary General of the Huqin Society of China, a solo performer and Artistic Director of the Folk Orchestra of the Cultural Troupe of the All China Federation of Unions, Visiting Professor at the People’s University of China, and a part-time lecturer at Beihang University.
Years of dedicated research and exploration into erhu performing techniques have given Gao a personal style that is a fine blend of the traditional and the contemporary that highlights the aesthetic beauty of the music while maintaining a purity in tone colour and elegance in taste.

Guo Yazhi
Suona

Formerly on the teaching staff of the Central Conservatory of Music in China, Guo is currently the Suona Principal of the HKCO.
He stuns the music world with his performance of the modernistic suona concerto, played on the improvised removable reed suona. He participated in the International Pro Musicis Competition held in New York in 1998, and won the only Grand Prize in the Finals. In the same year, he was selected by the Ministry of Culture of China as one of the most outstanding musicians in China.