The Silk Road as One of the Phenomena of Chinese Music: Past and Present

Abstract

The article presents two collective art projects for the fi rst time: the multimedia symphony “In Pursuit of the Dream of the Silk Road” and the large-scale macrocycle “The Silk Road”. Both of them consider the theme of the Silk Road in different genre-stylistic and dramatic planes. The concept of the interaction of the Silk Road with the artistic culture of China opens up broad and versatile perspectives for researchers of modern Chinese music. The point is not only that over the past twenty years dozens of quite original works have appeared, one way or another interpreting its cultural and even “economic” motives. A look at these experiences allows us to imagine a whole range of compositional and artistic trends that characterise the work of musicians of different generations, religious schools and ideological positions, as well as new searches in modern performance and music education. Two large collective projects presented in this article are inspired by the general artistic idea of the Silk Road. However, this concept is implemented in them with completely different genre-stylistic and technical means.