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Main Image for US-CHINA MUSIC INSTITUTE

US-CHINA MUSIC INSTITUTE

Photo by Karl Rabe
US-China Music
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    • Undergraduate Double Degree Program
    • China Now Music Festival
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    • Music at China Institute 华美音乐
    • MA in Chinese Music and Culture
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China Now Music Festival
Presented in collaboration with the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, the China Now Music Festival is dedicated to promoting an understanding and appreciation of classical music from contemporary China through an annual series of concerts and lectures. Each year’s festival explores a singular theme.
纽约中国当代音乐节与北京中央音乐学院合作举办,旨在通过年度系列音乐会和讲座,促进当代中国古典音乐的理解和欣赏。每年的音乐节都有一个独特的主题。

Bridging Cultures and Genres

“Politics often divides people, but in art and music you always find connections. With the China Now Music Festival as our looking glass, we hope to bring people and cultures from East and West together through music.” —Jindong Cai, Director, US-China Music Institute

China Now Music Festival 2022

October 7 - October 22

Bard College, Hudson Hall, Lincoln Center

  • East of West
    The US-China Music Institute of the Bard College Conservatory of Music and the Central Conservatory of Music, China, presented the 2022 China Now Music Festival, “East of West”, in celebration of our first five years of partnership and collaboration. The festival featured five major symphonic and operatic concerts held in New York City and in Upstate New York. Exciting new and rarely heard musical selections highlighted the cross-currents between China and the West, both in contemporary classical music and in artistic movements of the recent past.

    MORE INFORMATION

China Now Music Festival 2021

October 12 - October 17

Fisher Center, Bard College
Jazz at Lincoln Center, New York City

  • ASIAN AMERICAN VOICES
    In its fourth season, the China Now Music Festival showed itself to be a leading force in introducing music from contemporary China to the United States and in promoting musical exchanges between the US and China. This festival continued to pursue its vital mission while broadening the scope to include the voices of a wide array of Asian American composers, with the aim of exploring their importance in contemporary American music and society.

    The 2021 festival arrived in the midst of a particularly challenging time, shadowed by the global pandemic and a rise in anti-Asian discrimination and violence. The repertoire reflected how Asian American composers responded to the moment, as well as to the historical reception of Asians in America.

    Featuring composer-in-residence Huang Ruo, and ensemble-in-residence the Del Sol Quartet, along with many more composers and musicians, the 2021 China Now Music Festival connected culture, history, contemporary society, and the arts through a vibrant series of musical programs and discussion.

    MORE INFORMATION HERE

China Now Music Festival 2020

December 11 - December 18

Live • Online • Worldwide

  • China and Beethoven
    The year 2020 marked the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth. Celebratory events have been planned all around the world, and nowhere more so than in China, where classical music enjoys a huge following among audiences of all ages. When theaters, concert halls, and orchestras found themselves unexpectedly shuttered for much of the year, many celebrations were put on hold or re-imagined. As China began to reopen, Beethoven once again took center stage. 

    The third annual China Now Music Festival provided a window into celebrations happening in China during 2020, as well as exploring Beethoven’s enduring legacy during the changing politics of the 20th century and China’s oscillating affiliation with Western classical music.

    All events were presented online and free with registration. View the festival website for more information.

    More Information

China Now Music Festival 2019

September 28 -
October 6

Performances at Bard College, Carnegie Hall, and Stanford University

  • China and America—Unity in Music
    The second annual China Now Music Festival celebrated milestones in the history of U.S.-China relations through music. Highlights included the world premiere of a symphonic oratorio by Pulitzer Prize–winning composer Zhou Long honoring Chinese workers on the 150th anniversary of the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad, and a multimedia musical portrait of renowned diplomat Wellington Koo.
    More about the Festival
  • World Premiere: Men of Iron and the Golden Spike
    The festival featured the world premiere of Men of Iron and the Golden Spike, a symphonic oratorio by composer Zhou Long and lyricist Su Wei that was commissioned by the US-China Music Institute and the Center for East Asian Studies and Chinese Railroad Workers’ Project at Stanford University. Jindong Cai talks about the Bard–Stanford collaboration in an article for Stanford Live. Read the artickle

China Now Music Festival 2018

October 19 - October 22

Fisher Center, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center

  • Facing the Past, Looking to the Future: Chinese Composers in the 21st Century
    The inaugural season of the China Now Music Festival in 2018 featured U.S. and world-premiere works by some of the most important Chinese composers of our time, performed by Bard College's The Orchestra Now and conducted by Jindong Cai. 
    Performances included Tony Fok’s moving oratorio ‘Ask the Sky and the Earth’ about China’s ‘sent down youth’ during the Cultural Revolution, as well as symphonic works by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Zhou Long, Ye Xiaogang, Guo Wenjing, and more.
    Co-presented by the Central Conservatory of Music, China.
    learn more

Contact the US-China Music Institute

Bard College | PO Box 5000 | Annandale-on-Hudson, NY 12504-5000 | [email protected] | 845-758-7026

Bard Conservatory
Bard College
Conservatory of Music
30 Campus Road
Annandale-on-Hudson
New York 12504-5000
845-758-7196
[email protected]
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All photos by Karl Rabe unless stated otherwise.