When concerts for Christmas and New Year celebration start, the Central Conservatory of Music, the top academy of music in China, joins in. But it likes to provide the local audience with something different from Strauss and Radetsky March during its fourth campus music festival on Saturday evening.

Over 13 days, the conservatory's faculty and students, and their counterparts from Singapore and Germany, will present 27 concerts including recital, chamber, symphony, opera and electronic. In addition, there will be a piano competition, a vocal contest, a clarinet master class and an exhibition of Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989).

The Central Conservatory of Music started to hold the annual festival on campus from 2001. In its fourth year, the faculty is ambitious and is to open to the public, sell tickets and invite students and masters from foreign conservatories to participate.

"We have top music students in the country as well as strong faculty, most of whom return from abroad with solid academic training and rich performing experience," says Wang Cizhao, president of the Central Conservatory of Music. "I am confident that they can present high level concerts not inferior to some professional orchestras."

Wang hopes to attract more attention to talented young students as well as China's music education.

He wishes the festival to work as a platform to promote the communication between students and faculty with their counterparts from abroad.

Han Xiaoming, artistic director of the festival, shares Wang's view. "The collaboration with their foreign counterparts will broaden the vision of our students in terms of academic learning and performing."

The 43-year-old renowned horn player specially mentions the Sarrbrucken Conservatory's brass band. He says the Central Conservatory of Music is very good at piano and string, such as the violin. A number of students have won world competitions since the 1980s. But the brass department is a shortcoming.

"I hope the brass band from the German conservatory could bring something special and useful to our students and faculty," he says.

The artistic director also adds that for those students who spend most of their time in class and after-class practice by their own, the festival will enrich their experience of public performance.

"In addition, we also invite the China Philharmonic Orchestra and the China National Symphony Orchestra to perform in the festival. The concerts are good demonstrations and 'lessons' for the students," says Han.

Tomorrow evening, the festival will kick off with a picture exhibition of Karajan at the lobby of the concert hall inside the conservatory. The Vienna Karajan Foundation provides more than 200 photos of the master on his life and music. The exhibition will be on till the end of the festival on December 30.

The opening concert at the hall will be Bach's Christmas Oratorio performed by the students orchestra and choir from the Central Conservatory of Music and the orchestra from the Saarbrucken Conservatory under the baton of German conductor Thomas Kramaer. The concert will also feature German soprano Rosemarie Buhler, tenor Jan Kuschel and Chinese soprano Wu Yanyu and baritone Wang Haitao.

The next day, the joint-orchestra will move to perform the work at the Xuanwumen Catholic Church to create more atmosphere of Christmas.

Bach's work

It is the work's premiere in China, according to Han. Bach wrote it in Leipzig in 1733 and 1734 and first performed in its entirety in the Christmas season of 1734-1735.

"Chinese people have been familiar with many Christmas songs about Santa Claus but not this one, which tells a full story of the origin of the festival. We would like to introduce to them something new," says Han.

"The work is unusual for the genre 'oratorio.' It is not a single large work, like Bach's other oratorios. Instead, it is really six cantatas which were performed at six different times between Christmas Day and the feast of Epiphany, traditionally, on January 6," he introduces.

Although parts of the libretto is poetic, much of it is taken from the German translation of the Bible. Bach used portions of the Nativity story from the Gospels of Luke and Matthew in retelling the story.

The nine-movement first cantata On the First Day of the Festival of Christmas is scored for orchestra, chorus, soprano, tenor, and bass solos. It announces the birth of Christ, and reflects on the Holy Child.

In the second cantata On the Second Day of the Festival of Christmas, which consists of 14 movements, the angel appears to the shepherds in the field.

In the third cantata, the shepherds go to find Mary, Joseph, and the Baby Jesus; the shepherds return to their fields, glorifying God.

Then is On New Year's Day, which takes place eight days after Jesus was born. The seven-movement cantata, which is the shortest among the six, features the celebration of His circumcision and naming.

In the fifth, On the Sunday after New Year, three Wise Men arrive from the East and speak to King Herod, inquiring about the Child.

Finally, On the Feast of the Epiphany, Herod sends the Wise Men away, asking that they return to him with information so that he too might go and worship "the King."

The Wise Men follow the star to lowly Bethlehem, and rejoice in finding the Child; they offer him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. God warns them in a dream not to return to Herod and they return home by another route.

Mozart programme

Another eye-catching China debut performance in the festival is Mozart's opera The Clemency of Titus performed by the vocal students of the Central Conservatory of Music and under the baton of Lu Jia on December 28 and 29.

Commissioned to celebrate the coronation in Prague of Emperor Leopold II as King of Bohemia, The Clemency of Titus was written and performed in just 18 days. At the time Mozart was also working on The Magic Flute, and had started the Requiem. Three months later he died.

The story goes that Vitellia is in love with Titus, and is determined to get revenge when he seems to want to marry someone else. Titus, however, is determined to show clemency no matter what the provocation. The plot spirals into a confusion of love and conspiracy.

"A mainly choral composition punctuated by just 11 beautiful arias, this work shows the extent of Mozart's true and diverse genius," comments conductor Lu.

"Opera is the most sophisticated genre of classical music and it is very difficult for the vocal students," says Guo Shuzhen, dean of the Vocal Department.

"But from the rehearsal I could figure out that they work hard and will present a satisfactory performance," she says.

It is conductor Lu who suggested the repertoire. He says: "In terms of music, it is very nice and performing it will definitely do good as a training exercise for the vocal students."

He also adds that Beijing's theaters have very few operas; most are La Traviata or Madame Butterfly, just like Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty in ballet. "I hope to introduce more works to local audiences so as to broaden their vision."

The only regret is that it will be a concert-opera without settings.

Other highlights of the festival include an electronic concert by the electronic music centre of the conservatory directed by professor Zhang Xiaofu; cello solo and concerto with the theme of "Brazil Passion" by Professor Zhu Yibing and his students; antique piano by Shen Fanxiu and her students, Austrian pianist Florian Krumpoeck's recital.

Yang Yang and Li Xincao, both of whom graduated from the conducting department of the Central Conservatory of Music, will respectively take the baton of the China Philharmonic Orchestra and National Symphony Orchestra of China.

Yang is the assistant-conductor of the China Philharmonic Orchestra while Li is the principal conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra.

(China Daily December 17, 2004)