Yu Hong Mei

Yu Hong Mei has won many awards during her brilliant career. Most recently, she won the

China Golden Record Award for Best Solo Recording. She is the recipient of the Pro Musicis

International Award in New York City (2001). She is the first Chinese musician to win the coveted

Indie Award (1999) in the category of Best Traditional World Music for the CD entitled

String Glamour. Another solo CD, Red Plum Blossom Capriccio, won the Best Chinese Musical

Art Production in 1998. Her other awards include the 1989 Chinese Traditional Music

Competition for Erhu and the 1997 Taipei Concerto Competition

Yu Hong Mei was a soloist with the Chinese National Traditional Orchestra on their 2000

American Tour. Later that year, the same orchestra went to Paris for the China Cultural Arts

Concert. She has given several solo and concerto concerts with other prestigious groups

such as the China Philharmonic Orchestra, the China National Symphony Orchestra and the

Chinese Traditional Orchestra of Hong Kong. She has participated in numerous national and

international festivals, such as the International Computer Music Conference in Hong Kong

(1996) and in Beijing (1999), the Art Festival of Macao, the Kurashiki International Music

Festival in Japan, Beijing Modern Music Week, and many more.

She has introduced Chinese music to audiences in such prestigious concert halls as Avery

Fisher Hall and Carnegie Hall in New York, the Eisenhower Theatre at the Kennedy Arts

Centre in Washington DC, Chicago Symphony Orchestra Centre, Davis Symphony Hall in

San Francisco, Symphony Hall, Boston, and the Theatre des Champs-Elysees in Paris She

has always been highly praised for her wonderful performances.

Born in Jinan, capital of the Shandong province, Yu Hong Mei started learning the Erhu under

the guidance of the well-known Erhu Soloist Su Anguo when she was only 8. At the age

of 10 she was widely praised for her wonderful performance of A Flower Petal in the concert

of The Fall of Spring-Water City. She won several top prizes at Competitions for Young Instru

mentalists, which were held in the Shandong Province.

From 1984 to 1994, she devoted herself to the Erhu, first at the affiliated high school, and

later as an undergraduate of the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing. She repeatedly

won the ‘Outstanding Student Scholarship’ established by the College’s Shen Xingong Scholarship

and Fu Chengxian Scholarship.

After graduation she continued her study for a Master’s degree at the same college and was

carefully fostered and instructed by the famous Erhu soloists Professor Zhang Shao, Lan

Yusong and Liu Changfu. Among her recordings are the CDs ‘String Passion’ and ‘Chinese

Traditional Music Works.’ She has featured in many television productions including the musical

video ‘The Red Plum in Blossom’. As an excellent performer in the world of Chinese

music she has attracted wide attention and is considered to be one of the most talented Erhu

Soloists with a great influence on her fellow musicians. She is included in a compendium

encyclopedia entitled “Best Chinese Musicians of the Twentieth Century” published by the

China Musicians Association.