Bilingual opera singers perform in Suzhou festival

The Ising! 2017 International Young Artists Festival was held in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province from July 24 to Aug. 29.

Through competitive auditions in seven cities, 43 Western and Chinese talented artists were selected to participate in the full-scholarship program, which offered intensive training in both Western and Chinese modern opera, mandarin diction and the Chinese language.

Tian Haojiang, an internationally-renowned bass opera singer, directed and founded this festival. Tian, born in Beijing, enrolled in the Central Conservatory of Music in 1977 and went to the United States for further studies in 1983.

After coming back to China, Tian established the festival in Suzhou. He said the festival in Suzhou helped him realize his dream of having famous Chinese vocal pieces performed by opera singers from countries around the world.

Tian said Suzhou is the appropriate city for the festival because of its 2,000-year history.

"The young artists learned some Chinese and Chinese vocal pieces here," he said. "We are happy to have them here to learn about Chinese culture, Chinese people and music."

Tian said the motivation for founding the festival came from his experiences abroad, where he found that foreigners had limited knowledge about modern China.

"I should do something," he said."I know much more about the West than what they know about China. It is not balanced."

"What the young artists see, learn, sing and make friends here, it is an important experience for them."

"We hope the Chinese language could be a new one in the world vocal music stage. The foreign artists also can use Chinese to perform opera," Tian said.

Andrea Zaupa, hailing from Italy, performed in the lead during "Puccini's Gianni Schicchi." This was the second time he participated in the festival.

"The Chinese music deeply affected me, because the music is very sensitive, touching and moving," he said. "It's hard to hold back my tears."

Penelope Makeig, from the U.S., was one of the artists performing in the festival. She studied at the University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna. Makeig performed a song from the Yi ethnic group of China called "Please Stay, Guest From Afar."

"It is from Yunnan Province, and we will do some dance steps from this area," she said. "This is an incredible opportunity: I come to China, sing opera, learn some Chinese and get to know some culture that I had never experienced."

Li Weiwei, a young Chinese artist who had been in Italy for five years, said after she finished her undergraduate courses, she chose to continue her postgraduate study in Italy.

Li said many Chinese songs were already familiar to foreigners, and she hoped that she could be one of the artists who could know both Western and Chinese music and help spread Chinese vocal music in the world.