Wu Zhao

b. 18 December 1935, Suzhou, Jiangsu

Qin (seven-stringed zither) master, music historian

Wu Zhao studied qin under Zha Fuxi and Wu Jinglue. After graduating from Nankai University in Tianjin with a degree in history in 1959, he entered the National Music Institute of the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing and studied Chinese music history under Yang Yinliu. In 1985 he became the associate research fellow at the Research Institute of Music, China Academy of Arts, and in 1991, a fellow.

From 1981 until 1989 he was also the chair of the Chinese music history division of the same institute and in 1993 began to direct doctoral dissertations. As a qin expert, he was secretary and later director of the Beijing Guqin Research Society. Wu Zhao has been invited to lecture at the University of the Philippines (1988), the University of Michigan (1990) and the National Institute of the Arts, Taiwan (1994). In addition, he has been an external examiner of the Hong Kong Performing Arts Academy, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing. He has presented papers and performed qin in international conferences in France, Germany, Holland, the United States, Korea and Japan.

In addition to numerous research articles in scholarly journals, he has also published the following: Retracing the Lost Footprints of Music (iconographical history of Chinese music), A Short History of Chinese Music (co-author Liu Dongseng), Gems of Chinese Guqin (ed.), An Anthology of Qin Music (ed.), Guqin Teaching Fundamentals (5-VCD), Remembering an Old Friend (qin performance, CD), Autumn Moon Over the Han Palace (qin performance, CD), to mention only a few.

HAN KUO-HUANG