On April 16, PBS’s Great Performances will broadcast the world premiere of the documentary Beethoven in Beijing, which tells the story of classical music in China over the last half century through the lens of the Philadelphia Orchestra’s storied relationship with the country, from its first performances in the P.R.C. in 1973 until its most recent tour, in 2018. Along the way, the film profiles established Chinese musicians and composers, like Tán Dùn 谭盾 and Láng Lǎng 郎朗, and introduces us to new Chinese talent, like the composer Peng-Peng Gong 龚天鹏.
This week, Kaiser chats with three individuals involved with the film: co-director Jennifer Lin, a veteran Philadelphia Inquirer reporter and the author of the 2017 book Shanghai Faithful; producer Cài Jīndōng 蔡金冬, a professor of music and arts at Bard College, the director of the US-China Music Institute, and a former conductor of the Stanford Symphony Orchestra; and Sheila Melvin, a script consultant for Beethoven in Beijing and the co-author, along with her husband, Cai, of Rhapsody in Red and Beethoven in China, both books about classical music in the People’s Republic of China.
Recommendations:
Sheila: This viola concerto, performed by the Shanghai Philharmonic.
Jindong: The works of Zhōu Lóng 周龙.
Kaiser: A day in the life of Abed Salama, by Nathan Thrall, and Surviving the crackdown in Xinjiang, by Raffi Khatchadourian.
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U.S. Congressman Rick Larsen (D-WA) on his new U.S.-China policy white paper
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China Stories summer special: The best of This Week in China's HIstory
Wargaming a Taiwan invasion scenario: Lyle Goldstein on the CSIS wargame “The First Battle of the Next War"
The state of play of generative AI in China, with Paul Triolo
Is the Biden administration resetting U.S.-China relations?
The CFR Taiwan task force report: advice and dissent, with Maggie Lewis and Paul Heer
Transnational repression and China's "overseas police stations," with Jeremy Daum of Yale's Paul Tsai China Law Center
China after COVID: UPenn's Neysun Mahboubi reports on scholarly exchange in a tightening political space
China's Military-Civil Fusion program: CNAS fellow Elsa Kania on the myths and realities
Mr. Blinken goes to Beijing, with former NSC China Director Dennis Wilder
Economist Keyu Jin on her new book, "The New China Playbook"
David Ownby of ReadingtheChinaDream.com on the intellectual mood in China
Curtain-raiser on the Shangri-La Dialogue, with the man who runs the show: James Crabtree of IISS
Harvard's William Kirby on China's higher education system and his book "Empires of Ideas"
Does the Capvision raid signal a crackdown on consultancies in China? The China Project's CEO Bob Guterma, formerly of Capvision, weighs in
China's draft regulations on generative AI, with Kendra Schaefer and Jeremy Daum
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