The music of the contemporary Chinese composer and pianist Gao Ping, now resident in New Zealand, draws its inspiration from his native folklore, the oral tradition of story-telling familiar from his childhood in Sichuan, and Chinese poetry. The composer himself writes: “I have always thought of myself as a story-teller of sorts, but in place of words I use music.” The second of the Two Soviet Love Songs for Vocalizing Pianist, a hugely entertaining homage to Shostakovich, interweaves the Russian\ folk song Katyusha with fragments of the Scherzo of the Russian composer’s Tenth Symphony and Youman’s Tea for Two.