Onstage, the bamboo flute's rapid fingerwork traced winding alleyways as the sheng's elongated tones conjured ocean swells. The metallic shimmer of the liuqin entwined with the percussive plucks of the Portuguese guitar, sonically mirroring the interplay between Lingnan arcades and Macao's Portuguese-patterned cobblestones. A conductor's sweeping gesture unleashed explosive cymbal crashes - auditory fireworks erupting from Macao Tower's spire. Breathless silence held the audience until erupting applause crowned the Macao Chinese Orchestra's "Rhapsody of Youth" concert at the University of Macau's E31 Hall on March 15. As stage lights ascended, the ensemble unveiled their "Macao Capriccio".
Behind this performance lies the orchestra's 38-year creative odyssey. As Macao's sole professional traditional music institution, the 50-member ensemble has anchored its practice in "cultural rootedness and global conversation". Their artistic compass navigates from ancient classics like "Moonlit River in Spring" to boundary-crossing experiments: erhu-fado fusions during their 2024 Portugal tour, blues-infused reinterpretations of "Ode to the Seven Sons" at January's Hengqin festival. These innovations crystallize their artistic manifesto - cultivating a distinct "Macao Resonance" through historical consciousness, instrumental cross- pollination, compositional hybridity, and perpetual reinvention at East-West crossroads.
Rooted in history
Macao has a unique political advantage in the development of Chinese traditional music. Before Macao's return in 1999, the Macao government responded to the central government's call to develop Chinese traditional music, providing significant financial support to the Macao Chinese Orchestra. In the first fifteen years after return, the central government dispatched a group of outstanding musicians to Macao for international exchange. According to "Thirty Years of Chinese Music," the Macao Chinese Orchestra has toured various countries, including Portugal, Belgium, India, Goa, Singapore, and the Kingdom of Bahrain.
Mr. Zhuang Jiepai
Mr. Zhuang Jiepai was one of the first musicians entrusted by the central government to engage in exchanges in Portugal. He vividly remembers a fellow musician, a Soviet cellist named Yuli, who, upon arriving in Macao, ventured alone to the Gongbei border to buy a CD of "Butterfly Lovers." "He locked himself in his room, practicing with the accompaniment over and over again, hitting every note perfectly," Zhuang recalled with a smile. This group of pioneering Macao Chinese traditional musicians, with their outstanding musical talent and passion for Chinese traditional music, arranged pieces based on the main melodies of Portuguese folk songs, adding unique elements from Macao. These compositions, which blend Chinese and Western cultures, such as "Macao," "Taipa," and "East Lighthouse," resonate emotionally with both Chinese and foreign audiences, contributing to the development of global music.
Dialogue through instruments
Chinese and Western music developed along divergent paths. Western music emerged from court and church traditions, prioritizing precision before spreading to the public during the Renaissance. In contrast, Chinese music grew from folk expressions of daily life, its instruments—categorized since ancient times as "metal, stone, clay, leather, silk, wood, gourd, bamboo"—later adopted by Tang and Song courts. This contrast lives on in the Macao Chinese Orchestra's fusion of structural discipline with emotive flexibility.
Mr. Liang Rongchen, a cellist with the Macao Chinese Orchestra, mentioned, "When we learned the cello from a young age, we emphasized precision in scales. In the Chinese orchestra, we need to adjust for the emotional expression of Chinese traditional music, allowing for more flexibility and focusing on the nuances of the music."
Mr. Su Ziliang, a dizi player in the Macao Chinese Orchestra, also shared, "When playing famous Portuguese pieces like 'A Poa Well' on the flute, the dizi emphasizes emotional expression. Here, the note Do may not be just one pitch; we add harmonics and trills to create a richer emotional layer." The differences between Chinese and Western instruments have not led to a musical divide; rather, they promote mutual learning and integration. As Mr. Liang mentioned, "Musical progress requires the integration of Chinese and Western elements and continuous innovation." A single flower does not make spring; it is only when a hundred flowers bloom together that spring fills the garden. The differences between Chinese and Western instruments do not necessarily need to be eliminated; what is more important is to let music speak, telling our story as well as the world's story.
Su Ziliang (left), Liang Rongchen (right)
Compared to the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra, the Macao Chinese Orchestra have different choices of instruments. The Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra opts for lower-pitched string instruments with a wider range and greater volume, such as using the gehu instead of the cello. In contrast, the Macau Chinese Orchestra retains the cello to enrich the expression of the instruments, creating a grand chorus of cultural fusion.
Fusion in musical composition
On March 12, the University of Macao Chinese Orchestra's Splendid Melodies concert redefined contemporary interpretations of Chinese classical music—beginning with an audacious choice: a sinicized arrangement of Let It Go from Disney's Frozen. As the ensemble's erhus and dizis articulated the anthem's soaring melody, the student-dominated audience first swayed, then erupted into spontaneous song during the climactic refrain. The moment crystallized the orchestra's mission: dismantling perceptions of Chinese traditional music as sonically insular. "This wasn't crossover—it was reinvention," observed one attendee.
Mr. Xiao Renxin
Such a creative arrangement came from Mr. Xiao Renxin, conductor of the Chinese Orchestra of the University of Macau, whose cultural synthesis traces to The Butterfly Lovers Violin Concerto. Composed in 1958 as a Western chamber piece, its 1963 adaptation for Chinese instruments revealed transformative possibilities. "The erhu didn't merely replicate the violin—its grainier vibrato excavated deeper pathos," Xiao notes. This epiphany guides his work today: "True fusion isn't translation, but alchemy. "Macao's 400-year Lusophone-Chinese confluence fuels Xiao's innovation. His Macau Rhapsody (1999), commissioned for the Handover, transposed Portuguese guitarra idioms onto the liuqin's crystalline tones. "Lisbon audiences in 2012 didn't just recognize their fado roots—they heard them anew," he recalls. This duality mirrors Macao itself: a crucible where Iberian cadences and Cantonese lyricism refract through each other.
Structurally, the orchestra exploits latent compatibilities between musical systems. Hong Kong's 1980s wuxia soundtracks (The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber, The Legend of the Condor Heroes) demonstrated how pentatonic melodies absorb Western harmonies. China's gong-shang-jue-zhi-yu scale aligns with C-major's diatonic framework, while specialized techniques—erhu's microtonal slides or dizi's flutter-tongued trills—add strata of timbral nuance.
"Challenges remain. "Western orchestras refined blend over centuries; we're composing the rulebook in real time," Xiao admits. Acoustic gaps—the lack of natural bass resonance in bowed strings, or reed sections requiring brass bolstering—demand creative engineering. Even humidity becomes a variable: ceremonial datangu drums drift pitch in Macao's subtropical climate. Yet these very constraints spur innovation, as the ensemble negotiates between sonic fidelity and cultural authenticity—a dialectic shaping Chinese music's global evolution.
Innovations among young music enthusiasts
The evolution of Chinese traditional music now thrives on the cross-cultural ingenuity of a new generation. When Angolan student Shelcia first held an erhu at the University of Macau, she never imagined this Chinese instrument would become integral to her identity. Her journey began during the filming of the campus documentary Impressions of Chinese Traditional Music in Macao, where she portrayed a novice erhu player.
Shelcia (left)
Off-camera, however, the African student deciphered the emotional language of Chinese traditional music through its strings. This transcultural resonance inspired her to adapt Angola's traditional dance Rebita for the erhu, using glissandos to mimic African drum syncopation. "Emotion, connection, exchange—these words define my story with Chinese traditional music," she reflected. "It reshaped how I perceive the world, while I infused it with melodies from my homeland. When Angolan rhythms meet erhu techniques, both the music and I discover broader horizons."
Meanwhile, at the university's Choi Kwong Piu College, jazz drummer Lin Xuancheng faced a "cultural dissonance" upon gripping Chinese drumsticks for the first time. The leather-clad Gen-Z musician, known for improvisational solos, once dismissed Chinese traditional music as "exclusive to older generations"—until a Macao Chinese Orchestra performance electrified him: "When the Chinese bass drum erupted, I felt ancient battle commands coursing through me, not just technical thrill."
Lin Xuancheng (left)
Mastering this shift proved grueling: transitioning from German grip (emphasizing wrist flexibility) to vertical Chinese drumming (rooted in waist-driven force) required four-hour daily mirror drills and slow-motion biomechanical analysis. "In jazz, the conductor lives in my mind; in Chinese traditional music, the conductor steps out from my soul," he mused. To engage younger audiences, Lin advocates blending traditions— exemplified by the orchestra's upcoming adaptation of the symphonic piece Kiki's Delivery Service. "This fusion will redefine innovation," he grinned.
Their stories embody the vision of Wang Guangqi, who wrote in A Comparative Study of Eastern and Western Musical Systems: "I shall ascend the Kunlun summit, play the Yellow Bell tuning, and reignite the musical blood inherent in our people. Thus shall the 'Youthful China' I dream of emerge." Today's youth are revitalizing this legacy through bold experimentation. As Lin declared: "We'll let the world hear a younger voice of Chinese traditional music— one that breaks boundaries yet honors its roots."
Since the return of Macao, the development of Chinese traditional music in Macao has been rapid, but at the same time, it has also faced difficulties and challenges. Firstly, the Macao Chinese Orchestra is facing the dilemma of saturation of musicians. A group of musicians in the 1990s did not reach retirement age, so a group of young musicians who returned from overseas could not occupy a place in the orchestra. Mr. Liang, who has caught up with the dividends of the times, said, "One carrot needs one hole, but there are more carrots." Secondly, Macao is a city dominated by the gambling industry. According to the 2023 report by the Macao Bureau of Statistics, the gambling industry in Macao accounts for 38.3% of the total added value. Moreover, with a relatively small population base, 'Since everyone has gone to the casino, who would still come to the concert?' Mr. Zhuang shook his head helplessly. Even if there are more carrots, there must be enough consumers to maintain the balance of supply in Chinese traditional music. Furthermore, Macao currently lacks the ability to cultivate local Chinese traditional musicians. Nearly 90% of the musicians in Chinese orchestras are either imported from Chinese mainland or returned to Macao after studying in Chinese mainland. The policy advantage of "One Country, Two Systems" does provide support for Macao Chinese traditional music, but relying on being a "musical giant baby" is difficult to produce a final performance that resonates with the audience.
As Mr. Zhuang said, 'The orchestra is a symbol of a city,' and the Chinese orchestra is a milestone in witnessing the integration of Chinese and foreign cultures in Macao, and moving towards the world and the future. We look forward to more seedlings of Chinese traditional music taking root and sprouting in Macao, continuing to write more exciting stories of Chinese traditional music.
References:
Macao Statistics and Census Service. (2023). Annual Report on Macao's Industrial Structure. Government of the Macao Special Administrative Region.
Wang Guangqi. (1936). Preface to A Comparative Study of Eastern and Western Musical Systems. In Selected Works of Wang Guangqi on Music (pp. 1-15). Shanghai: Zhonghua Book Company.
Macao Chinese Orchestra. (2018). Thirty Years of Music: A History of the Macao Chinese Orchestra. Cultural Affairs Bureau of Macao.
Zhouli Zhushu [Annotations on the Rites of Zhou]. (2000). In Li Xueqin (Ed.), Collated Edition of the Thirteen Classics with Commentaries. Beijing University Press.
Cultural Development Advisory Committee. (2021). White Paper on the Operation of Cultural Facilities in Macao. Cultural Affairs Bureau of the Macao Special Administrative Region.
Composition Group of The Butterfly Lovers. (1959). Full Score of the Violin Concerto "The Butterfly Lovers". Shanghai Music Publishing House.
Xian Xinghai. (1939). Manuscript of the Yellow River Cantata. Central Conservatory of Music Archives.
Reporter | Chen Ziqi, Sui Xinyi, Wang Yixin
The reporters are from the University of Macau.
