Virtuoso plucked to be resident artist
Pipa player kicks off Shanghai Symphony Orchestra's new season in major role, as she continues to promote traditional music to the world, Zhang Kun reports.
The Shanghai Symphony Orchestra opened its 2025/26 season on Sept 5 with a performance by its new artist in residence, Wu Man, of Pipa Concerto No 2 by Chinese composer Zhao Jiping.
Widely recognized as the world's premier pipa (a four-stringed Chinese lute) virtuoso, Chinese American musician Wu is one of the first Chinese folk music instrumentalists invited by the orchestra to serve as artist in residence. The decision was "a tribute to her artistic accomplishments and her achievements in promoting Chinese music worldwide, as well as an expression of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra's attitude toward inheriting and promoting Chinese culture", says Yu Long, music director of the orchestra and conductor of the concert.
Wu played Zhao's Pipa Concerto No 2, a piece tailor-made for her, which also illustrates Zhao's personal style as an international award-winning composer best known for his music in the movies Red Sorghum and Farewell My Concubine.
The concerto adopts the tones of Suzhou pingtan, a traditional form of storytelling and ballad singing, and features beautiful melodies and adept use of the pipa. "I used to play the piece overseas, and audiences immediately liked it," she says.
Later in the new season, Wu will play two concertos with the orchestra that were also tailor-made for her. On May 22, 2026, she will play Lou Harrison's Concerto for Pipa with String Orchestra under the baton of Jing Huan. This piece helped Wu win a nomination for Best Instrumental Soloist at the 51st Grammy Awards in 2009.
On June 5, she will collaborate with British conductor Jonathan Nott to present the Chinese premiere of Du Yun's composition Ears of the Book. Du was the first Chinese musician to win the Pulitzer Prize for music in 2017. The piece was created while Du "was literally imagining how Wu Man is going to sit on the stage", according to a 2024 interview with the composer by Lana Norris, a conductor, pianist, and educator based in New York City. "I'm looking at who she is and her energy," says Du.
The pipa is a lutelike plucked-string instrument with four strings. It originated in West Asia and was introduced to China in the second century. It has since developed into a prominent instrument in Chinese opera orchestras and solo performances.
