China Daily Global Edition (USA)
France recognizes conductor with prestigious honor
Xu Zhong given major award by culture ministry in Paris,
Maestro Xu Zhong, president of the Shanghai Opera House, received the prestigious Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters honor from the French Ministry of Culture and Communication on Dec 15.
According to Joan Valadou, the French consul general in Shanghai, Xu won the award “for his outstanding musical attainments, as well as significant contributions to SinoFrench cultural exchanges and global cultural communication’’.
Established in 1957, the Order of Arts and Letters is one of the highest honors the French government can bestow onto people.
While many Chinese who have excelled in the field of art or literature have been awarded the “Chevalier”, only a few have been awarded the Officer.
The 52-year-old pianist-turnedconductor is the first Asian musician to serve as the artistic director and chief conductor of the Teatro Massimo Bellini in Italy, and the first Chinese musician appointed as music director and chief conductor of the Israel Haifa Symphony Orchestra.
In his career, Xu has worn many hats, including the principal director of the Fondazione Arena di Verona in Italy, the president of the Shanghai Opera House, the first international chair of opera representing Asia at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, and the external expert observer of BBC Cardiff Singer of the World in the United Kingdom.
Xu is currently busy with the rehearsal of Tosca, a coproduction by the National Center for the Performing Arts, the Shanghai Opera House and the Shaanxi Opera House.
He has composed an original opera titled Homeland, and recently conducted its concert version at the Nine Trees Future Art Center in suburban Shanghai’s Fengxian district.
He was also the music director and composer of the dance drama production White Snake, which premiered at the Shanghai Grand Theater in November.
The dance theater production featured a star-studded cast of awardwinning dancers led by Tan Yuanyuan, the principal ballerina with the San Francisco Ballet.
Xuan Jing, with Wenhui Daily, comments on Xu’s composition, saying that “he brought Chinese instruments such as pipa (the bamboo flute) and guzheng (Chinese zither) into the classical orchestra to create a rich and colorful set of music. You could find compositions of waltz, tango and flamenco, as well as modern electronic music effects.”
The East-West fusion of music and international aesthetics “display diversity to the extreme” and provide plenty of creative space for the choreographer, he adds.
Xu is now planning to take this dance drama to France.
“As a Chinese musician, I am very lucky to have won applause from all over the world,” says the musician. “I hope to draw ‘cultural bridges’ with my baton, so that more good music and operas from China will be showcased on international stages to be heard, seen and liked by people across the world,” he says.
A global ambassador for classical music, especially for opera, Xu was named president of the Shanghai Opera House in 2016. He has since taken the company to many international performance arenas, including the London Coliseum, the Musikfestspiele Saar in Saarbrucken, Germany, the Saaremaa Opera Festival in Estonia, and the Dubai Opera.
He has also greatly expanded the company repertoire and helped improve the standard of opera performances.
A new grand opera theater is under construction in Pudong district, and the Shanghai Opera House will be the leading group providing quality opera performances there.
“You can’t raise the bar for opera performance overnight. It has to be achieved through continual efforts in producing quality works and nurturing of new talent,” Xu says.
The Shanghai Opera House was used to work primarily on Italian opera productions. Meanwhile, a few productions in German or French, the other two leading languages of classical opera, were performed at the opera house.
This changed significantly when Xu took over as its president as he made sure that vocal and diction classes were given at the company on a weekly basis.
These classes were uninterrupted even during the pandemic as the company resorted to holding them via internet conference.
As a Chinese musician, I am very lucky to have won applause from all over the world.”
In 2018, the company premiered a German production, Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman at the Theater Erfurt in Germany.
That same year, the coproduction of Lehar’s The Land of Smiles by the Shanghai Opera House and the Mupa Budapest was presented in Hungary to mark the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Hungary.
In 2019, Xu conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for the opening concert of the China Night series at the Barbican Center in London. In the summer, he conducted opera Rabe’s Diary in Berlin and in Vienna, Austria.
In addition to these classic pieces, the Shanghai Opera House has been actively exploring new possibilities with original Chinese opera, performing many Chinese operas including Thunderstorm, The Wager and dance drama Early Spring in February to critical acclaim.
Next year, the Shanghai Opera House will collaborate with the National Opera of Bavaria to debut Wagner’s Lohengrin in Shanghai.
According to Xu, the international opera community has witnessed a rapid growth in China’s audience for opera art, and has firm confidence for the Chinese market. This year, as China further lifted restrictions on cross-border travel, a new chapter for international communication will begin, he notes.
A native of Shanghai, Xu was born to a family of respected medical professionals. He started to play the piano at 3 years old and was, at 16, admitted to the Paris Conservatory in France.
During his time in France, he won first prize at the 34th Maria Canals International Piano Competition in Barcelona, and was awarded the top prize in piano by the conservatory upon graduation.
It was also at the Paris conservatory that he developed an interest in conducting.
Xu has since performed on the stage of the La Philharmonie de Paris, and conducted French masterpieces with the Orchestre de Paris.
In 2010, he was awarded the “Chevalier” of the Order of Arts and Letters, receiving the honor from the former French president Valery Giscard d’Estaing, who praised him as “the best interpreter of French music in China”.
Xu Zhong, conductor