Stanford Inaugurates New Pan-Asian Music Festival This February
PALO ALTO, Calif — Stanford University will be holding its first Pan-Asian Music Festival Feb. 8 - 12 with five events spanning the roots of classical Indian and Chinese music and hot-off-the-presses compositions by living Asian composers.
Performers will include Oscar-winning documentary director Allan Miller; artist Yang Jiechang; composers Chinary Ung, Hyo-Shin Na and Zhou Long; and the celebrated On Ensemble taiko performers from Los Angeles.
The festival will open with a discussion of classical music in China with Jindong Cai and Sheila Melvin, co-authors of Rhapsody in Red: How Western Classical Music Became Chinese, followed by traditional instrumentals of China and India: the pipa (played by Xiao-Fen Min) and the sitar (played by Habib Khan).
The closing concert by the Stanford Symphony Orchestra will include the U.S. premieres of works by Ung and Zhou and selections from “Passages,” a collaborative composition by Ravi Shankar and Phillip Glass.
The cost of admission to the festival, to take place at Dinkelspiel Auditorium, is $10 (general) and $5 (with student ID).
Top Honor in Children’s Books Go to Work on J-A Girl
BOSTON — A book about a Japanese American girl growing up in the U.S. South garnered top honors from the American Library Association.
Kira-Kira, by Cynthia Kadohata, received the 2005 John Newbery Award at the ALA’s annual meeting at Boston. The award honors outstanding writing in a book for young people. A 15-member committee of librarians and children’s literature experts selected Kira-Kira, said committee head Susan Faust.
“What’s really compelling here is the quietude of the book, in that there’s both pathos and humor, and I think that the book kind of radiates a sense of hope from the inside out,” Faust said.
17th Annual Chinese New Year Rooster Festival
MIAMI — The Chinese Cultural Foundation and the Organization of Chinese Americans - South Florida chapter will hold their 17th Annual Chinese New Year Festival on Sunday, Feb. 13, at Miami Dade College - Kendall Campus.
The event features Chinese acrobat shows, traditional folk dances and music. Another major attraction is the thundering rhythms of Japanese taiko drummers. In accordance with the Chinese good-luck tradition, the Chinese dragon and lion dances will usher in the festivities.
The Asian American Federation of Florida for Tsunami Relief Fund will have a booth to collect donations for tsunami victims.
The cost of admission is $6 for adults and $3 for children ages 6-12.
Joan Chen Aspires to ‘Terminator’ Roles
HONG KONG — Chinese-born Hollywood actress Joan Chen, who starred as an empress in the Oscar-winning The Last Emperor, says she aspires to action roles like Linda Hamilton’s part in Terminator.
“I think I could be very good at this. I’m a naturally born muscle woman,” Chen said.
She said she turned down action roles when she was younger because she “had such scorn for them” and wanted to do only drama, but she has since changed her mind.
Chen was a star in her native China before leaving for the United States in 1981. Since her turn in The Last Emperor, she has tackled roles including that of a wartime Vietnamese mother in Heaven and Earth and a supernatural temptress in Temptation of a Monk.
She has also directed films including Autumn in New York, which starred Richard Gere and Winona Ryder.