Gao Ping: Shuo Shu Ren; Distant Voices; Cello Sonata No.2

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.