The guqin is a unique
Chinese musical instrument with many playing techniques that needs to be taught
orally by masters. Unfortunately, there are very few guqin teachers in
the United States. More and more people are people are becoming fascinated by
the guqin but cannot find a qualified teacher. Even self-teach is very
difficult because there is no English instructional material.
NAGA is planning a 5 week intensive
workshop starting March 12th, 2013.
Courses objectives
The goal of this workshop is to
enable participants to experience what the guqin is, and learn authentic guqin playing from a master in a very short period. The course will
concentrate on the major left and right hand techniques.
Participants will meet other
people with the same interest from different areas and make qin friends.
Special event
On the evening of Janurary 24th, NAGA
will organize a guqin gathering with Professor Zhao Jiazhen in Union City, at
which participants will experience listening to live guqin performances by different qin players from different schools and teachers as well as discover other art forms
and other music tranditions, and share each
other’s insights etc.
After the workshop
1.NAGA
recently established a new office in Beijing which will be devoted to international
guqin cultural exchange and will introduce a guqin-themed hotel, restaurants,
concert hall, theater, exhibitions, recording studio, qin making studio, qin
classrooms with bilingual instruction, etc. Our 2013 international NAGA class +
cultural tour will take place from October 18-25. All participants can enroll
in that tour, coming soon. Please see our past tours at http://www.chineseculture.net/guqin/newsletters/2010nagaevents/beijingtour101010.htm
3.Non-local participants can
teach themselves by following NAGA’s instructional material set (book, video,
Chinese English dictionary of guqin terms, etc).
Times and dates and fees
1.Group lessons, Sundays, 1 to 3pm, start March 12th, 2013 or eariler whenever
5-8 people are filled. $420 for 5 Sundays
Priviate individual sessions are also available. Please contact info@guqin.org to make an appointment. $420 for 4 sessions. Each session lasts 1.5 hours.
Venue
Union City, CA. Address to be
announced after registration. Accessible by public transportation.
Class size
Because we intend to run a
beginner-friendly group using a traditional teaching style, one student per guqin,
space is limited.
Instruments
Instruments
can be rented for the full 4 sessions duration of the course (normal cost $50);
rental can be credited towards the purchase of a qin. Instruments can also
be purchased from the teacher.
Participants
who enroll and pay before Dec. 28th will have free guqin rental, and will be able to take the instrument home to practice. Please
register now.
Good guqins will be provided for use during the classes, one for each
student. Participants do not need to bring their own instruments.
Instructor
Classes will be led by NAGA
Director and China Guqin Committee Council member Wang Fei. Wang Fei has
a background in classical Chinese literature and guqin music and has
been a Mandarin news host and producer at China National Radio. She studied guqin under Professor Li Xiangting, one of the great guqin masters of this
century, since 1985. She has inherited the traditions, styles, concepts and
masterpieces of her “grand teachers” Zha Fuxi, Wu Jinglue and Guan Pinghu, the
three greatest guqin masters of the last century, and transmits them
through her guqin teaching, performance and promotion in the western
world. Wang Fei is one of the few guqin teachers who offer guqin lessons in traditional form, covering both guqin playing and guqin study. She has won several awards for Chinese music, has toured internationally
and has given speeches, lectures, workshops and seminars on the guqin at
many prestigious universities including Stanford, UC Berkeley, UCLA and the
Central Conservatory of Music. She has also given presentations on Chinese
culture to many Fortune 500 companies.
For a brief introduction to the guqin in English,please see
The
number of places is limited, and space is available on a
first-come-first-served basis, so please register now! Email registration is
highly recommended! Please click here for registration form and email to info@guqin.org:
Please send your payment to along with the registration form to:
The North American Guqin
Association (NAGA) is a nonprofit cultural arts organization dedicated to
the public presentation and preservation of the art of the guqin,
spreading community appreciation of Chinese culture through the traditional art
of the guqin and building a bridge for cultural exchange and mutual
understanding between the Chinese and American communities. NAGA offers guqin classes, performances, recordings, workshops etc.
Please subscribe to the
following NAGA social networks to stay tuned for incoming news and events:
North American Guqin Association