^B00:00:13 >> Chao Tian: Hello everyone. Thank you so much for tuning in to Homegrown Concert. My name is Chao Tian. This is my collaborator, Tom Teasley. We're now at Tom's home studio. And we are going to share some new works inspired by the music from Beijing, China, where is my hometown. The first music we are going to play is called Song of Snails. It is a Beijing nursery rhyme. This song come up with two lines of lyrics talking about the parents' love to their kids. It says "Snail, snail. You shoot out your horns. Then your head. Your father and mother will buy some roasted food for you." You don't want to know what kind of roasted food. But it's love from parents. So, Tom will join an original melody later and do something new with improvisation. ^M00:01:13 ^M00:01:20 [ Music ] ^M00:06:25 ^M00:06:30 That's a version very different from what I heard since I was a kid. It's very new to me. Okay. So, the collaboration between me and Tom is about to using improvisation to create a musical dialog between US and China. Three years ago, we went to Beijing, China for a teaching residency program. We spent a wonderful time together there. And Tom - that was Tom's first time being into China, Beijing. And I think he gained the first hand's impression of Beijing. We went to the famous Forbidden City, which is the former Chinese imperial palace after the emperor of China. It's a very beautiful place. We had a coffee there. You know, it's very interesting to see the strong contrast between a coffee shop and the ancient Chinese palace. So, the next piece we're going to create a picture according to that thing, café, at the Forbidden City. ^M00:07:46 ^M00:07:50 [ Music ] ^M00:13:27 Thank you so much. We hope you liked this very new contemporary improvisation try. So, in that China trip, Tom had a chance to stay in a Chinese neighborhood. And I guess he had some kind of special experience with that memory. Tom, would you like to share a little bit with the audience? >> Tom Teasley: I sure would. My trip to Beijing was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. Usually, when I'm travelling internationally, I'm staying at a fancy hotel. But this time I felt like I was really living in the community. And as a result, I would go into the market. And I would buy my fruit and vegetables. I would come back and cook. And I kept seeing the same people in the market, you know? And really became a part of the community. So, it was a very special time for me. And I think that that experience of going into the community and developing personal relationships really affected my music with that that I hope I'm bringing back and sharing with Chao. >> Chao Tian: Wonderful, wonderful. So, the place that Tom stayed actually was a alley, a traditional alley, in Beijing. We call this traditional alley Hutong. So, that's a Beijing dialect. The next piece we're going to create a piece called Hutong Fantasy. ^M00:14:58 ^M00:15:03 [ Music ] ^M00:20:35 Wonderful. So, the next piece we're going to play is called Visiting the Quingshui River. It as a Beijing Folk ballad. The story of this song tells the tragedy of a star-crossed lovers that couldn't stay together. So, they ended up their lives, one after another, due to the pressure from the conflicts of tradition and both the family's side. So, this song is also a criticism of oppressive social order during the late Ching Dynasty. We will try to start with original melody. And in this piece, we want to create a very dramatic moment to bring you into this tragedy moment. ^M00:21:35 ^M00:21:45 [ Music ] ^M00:26:48 ^M00:27:00 Thank you so much. We hope you enjoyed the music. So, the last piece we're going to play is called Beijing Opera Tune. It's a composition made by Chinese musician [inaudible] in 1960. The music borrows some elements from the Peking Opera. So, it's very famous orchestra tune. We are going to make a new version of this piece. ^M00:27:35 ^M00:27:43 [ Music ] ^M00:32:46 ^M00:32:53 Thank you so much for watching our concert. Thanks to the American Folk Life Center at the Library of Congress for having us on this concert series. Thank you so much to Jim Robson Productions for producing this video. We hope to share more music in the future with you. Thank you.