Family ties draw legend's grandson back to music

Zhang Kemin tried his hardest to resist becoming a professional musician like his grandfather, the late Chinese conductor Li Delun (1917-2001).

"I was rebellious. Almost everyone in my family is a musician and I wanted to be different," says Zhang, 36, who has learned piano, violin and viola since childhood. He took on a variety of jobs to distract him from music, from working in venture capital firms to comedy clubs.

But he has found himself in music nonetheless, and recently he played piano to accompany US soprano Kerry Holahan, kicking off The Spirit of America tour, organized by American Cultural Center Tours' Ping Pong Productions in association with Li Delun Music Foundation.

More than 200 people, Chinese and expatriates, packed the library of the Beijing American Center. They performed songs by Broadway legend Cole Porter, including Night and Day and Anything Goes, and told stories about the composer's life.

"We became friends a long time ago. He is very nice and funny. When I made mistakes during a performance, he will say it's his fault," says Holahan, who moved to Beijing as an exchange student 10 years ago.

Zhang and Holahan will tour universities around China, spreading their love of Broadway music to Chinese audiences.

"My aunt told me that the project I am doing is just like what my grandfather used to do," Zhang says. "He used go around with a cassette player and a stack of tapes, and gave lectures about classical music everywhere, from universities to factories. He enjoyed classical music so much that he loved sharing his knowledge with people in the hope that they can learn to appreciate it, too."

Zhang and his parents moved to Toronto, Canada in 1990. When he returned to Beijing, he stayed with his grandparents. It is an old apartment in the capital's downtown area and it is where he was born and raised.

Located near the China National Symphony Orchestra, the apartment block is home to many of China's great musicians, including Li and his violinist wife Li Jue (1922-2013).

"That's me, around 2 years old, sitting in my grandfather's arms," says Zhang, pointing to a black-and-white photo, in which he is wearing a pair of big headphones and waving his tiny arms like a conductor.

"Music is like air to me. When I was little, my grandfather always played music in the house, such as Tchaikovsky or Beethoven. I never saw it as a profession, but it has always been a part of my life."

Zhang's family had a hand in the development of classical music in China as well as cultural communication between China and the rest of the world. But Zhang wasn't aware of his grandfather's fame until he was an adult. In his memories, "grandpa was just a plump, humorous old man who liked to tell jokes".

In 1977, Li broke the 10-year ban on Western classical music by presenting Beethoven's Fifth Symphony in a concert commemorating the 150th anniversary of the composer's death. This marked China's first public performance of Western music since the "cultural revolution" (1966-76).

Two years later, US violinist Isaac Stern (1929-2001) collaborated with the China Central Symphony Orchestra (now China National Symphony Orchestra) under the baton of Li, performing Mozart and Brahms' violin concertos, which started a series of musical cultural exchanges between the two countries.

In 1998, Li visited his daughter's family in Toronto and suggested his grandson return to China to help out at the Beijing Music Festival, founded by Yu Long, who later became the artistic director of the China Philharmonic.

For Zhang, who was bored with his studies of modern art theories at the Ontario College of Art and Design, the idea was very attractive.

"My grandfather tempted me with perks, such as getting to go to concerts and operas for free for an entire month. I'd also get to spend more time with grandpa," he says.

Later the same year, Li was hospitalized due to a stroke, and Zhang decided to stay in China to take care of him.

Despite not following in his family's music tradition, Zhang has inherited musical talent and created his own path.

After his directorial debut in 2008 on a production of Oliver! In Beijing, he spent three years writing his first musical The Joker's Game, telling the love story of a magician in a modern world filled with illusions. The show was staged in China on 2012.

Recently he has been working with CCTV on a magic show, combining his music with magic tricks. He also participates in cultural exchange programs as the executive director of the Li Delun Music Foundation, which was launched in 2002 in memory of the late conductor.

"When I was 14, my grandfather asked me, 'What is your reason for being alive?' " recalls Zhang. "I didn't have an answer at the time. Over the years, he would ask me that question every once in a while, and each time, I would have a different answer. But now I want to answer him that I want to contribute to the culture of the world."

If you go:

3 pm, April 12. Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, 798 Art District, 4 Jiuxianqiao Lu (Road), Chaoyang district, Beijing. 01057800200.