China

For the last three decades, performer and composer Wu Man 吴蛮 has been a leading ambassador for Chinese music, blending traditional and contemporary elements through the pipa, a four-stringed plucked lute. Born in Zhejiang Province, she has been featured on two Smithsonian Folkways albums: Music of Central Asia: Borderlands (2012), for which she collaborated with Hui, Tajik, and Uyghur musicians, to explore connections between the musical worlds of China and Central Asia, and The Silk Road: A Musical Caravan (2002). For her Smithsonian Folklife Festival evening performance, Wu Man was joined by Haruka Fujii, an acclaimed percussionist from Japan who has performed with Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road ensemble, and Yang Yi 杨艺, a leading virtuoso on zheng, the Chinese twenty-one-string zither, who directs the Yang Yi Guzheng Academy.

Wu Man and Friends perform in the Moonrise Pavilion.

Photo by Francisco Guerra, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Wu Man performs on the pipa in the Moonrise Pavilion.

Photo by Pruitt Allen, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Wu Man performs on the pipa in the Moonrise Pavilion.

Photo by Francisco Guerra, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Haruka Fujii changes between multiple percussion instruments.

Photo by Francisco Guerra, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Haruka Fujii, acclaimed percussionist from Japan, performs in the Moonrise Pavilion.

Photo by Hermine Dreyfuss, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Yang Yi performs on the Chinese zither in the Moonrise Pavilion.

Photo by Francisco Guerra, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Yang Yi performs on the Chinese zither in the Moonrise Pavilion.

Photo by Francisco Guerra, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution