Celebrating the Close of the Asian Music Series! Amely Zhou & Friends Ticket Giveaway 

The end of May approaches and our 16th Annual Asian Music Series is coming to a close. It’s been a great run of concerts and it ends with two exciting events.

Tomorrow at the Small World Centre, it’s a Far East culture-blending affair, anchored by intrepid erhu player Amely Zhou. The ensemble expresses cultural differences and commonality through their own musical language with Yi Wang on sheng, one of China’s oldest free reed polyphonic instruments, Lipeng Wu on dizi, Roa Lee on gayageum and Ravi Naimpally on tabla, returning to the Centre after Near East’s sold out show Saturday. Expect masterfully interpreted classics similar to this gem, performed in the 2016 Asian Music Series under Strings Across Asia, watch “Galloping War Horses.”

The evening also begins with a rare treat – Indonesian kacapi-suling music. Performed by Andrew Timar and Bill Parsons, the ephemeral sounds of the bamboo flute and zither transport to a place of meditation. Share the Facebook event page by 5pm for a chance to win a pair of tickets!

Saturday the series concludes with Tatsuya Nakatani’s Gong Orchestra presented by the Music Gallery. A unique enterprise, growing community engagement project and the only bowing gong orchestra in existence. The rich harmonies produced from multiple layers of bowed gongs are transformative, engaging and inspiring for both players and audiences. As per Nakatani’s instructions, an ensemble of fourteen local players will learn how to play his handmade gongs and perform later that day.

Looking past our series, the composers at Spectrum have created a distinctly Canadian repertoire for traditional Chinese instruments. Next Saturday Patty Chan on erhu, Di Zhang on the yangqin and Ziwen Qin on the gu zheng take up residence at the Alliance Française in “No Place Like Home.”