String Quartet No.1 – Childhood Memories 19’

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String Quartet No. 1, titled Childhood Memories, is an homage to my early years growing up in old Beijing. This single-movement, rhapsodic work draws its melodic and motivic elements from the sounds of my childhood in the 1970s and much of the 1980s—traditional street folk arts, the rhythmic chants of street vendors peddling everything from newspapers to ice cream, and even a communist children’s song. The piece evokes a joyful nostalgia for a simpler time, especially in contrast to what Beijing has become today: an international, metropolitan, capitalistic, and vibrant city. Yet, it also carries a bittersweet realization that those days are gone forever—and perhaps, they were never meant to return. This tension between sweetness and sorrow lies at the heart of the music.

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