Chen Xieyang

Music Director & Principal Conductor of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra

Chen Xieyang had his musical training at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music: as piano student in 1953, and later he studied conducting with Prof. HUANG Xiaotong. Graduating with high honors in 1965, he became resident conductor of Shanghai Ballet Orchestra where he served for more than fifteen years. At the invitation of the Centre of U. S.-China Arts Exchange in September 1981, he left for New York and studied with Prof. Otto Mueller of Yale University, during which time he conducted a number of orchestras, including the Aspen Music Festival's orchestra in 1982 with great success. In august 1983 at the request of the French record company Kuklos CBE, CHEN has conducted the Central Phiharmonic Orchestra of Beijing, for the recording of Beethoven's First and Fourth Symphonies. From September 1983 till January 1985 he has taken part in the direction of an enormous epic of music and dance entitled "Song of the Chinese Revolution", and since 1985 he has successively conducted concerts in the former USSR, Japan, Italy, USA, England, Switzerland, North and South Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Australia, Germany, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan where he was warmly welcomed and highly praised. While leading the China Central Traditional Orchestra in January 1998 and February 1999 for concert tour to Austria, Germany and Denmark, CHEN has successfully conducted New Year concerts in the world-famous Grosser Saal of Vienna as well as the Berliner Philharmoniker Hall; while leading the same orchestra in August 2000 for concert tour to the U. S., he conducted New Year concerts in the Lincoln Center of New York; and in November of the same year, has participated in the serial concerts of the "Chinese Cultural Season" in Paris hosted by the Cultural Ministry of China.

CHEN was awarded the Excellent Conducting Prize in 1987 Shanghai Spring Music Festival, and in 1989 a Golden Record Prize for conducting the "Butterfly Lovers" Violin Concerto.

In addition to the above, CHEN has conducted ZHU Jian-er's ten symphonies and other works of his, which scores and CDs already published and released to the market by the Shanghai Music Publishing Society in 2002.

As China's first rank conductor, CHEN Xieyang is currently the music director and principal conductor of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, vice chairman of Shanghai Musicians Association, Member of Standing Committee of China Musicians Association, and president of Shanghai Symphonic Music Appreciators Society. He has been successively listed in Who's Who in the World of Music by the Cambridge Biographic Center since 1987.