An Invitation to Teach, from the Governor of Hebei Province
HOW IT ALL CAME ABOUT, AND WHAT WE'LL DO WITH IT
(Last modified: $Date: 2002/05/08 15:24:33 $)
There have been a few other barbershop choruses who have travelled to China in the past, and there will undoubtedly be more in the future. As any country, China is hungry for tourist dollars. But, as far as we know, nobody has had the opportunity to "teach" the structure of barbershop music yet in China. Edward Pio Travel, the tour operator with whom MHBQA has been coordinating over the last few years (and with whom Kim & Jerry Orloff worked as individuals when they escorted the Garden City Chorus to New Zealand/Australia in 1995 and to Hawaii in 1998,) has been leading bicycle tours and performing jazz group tours through China for nearly eight years. (Ed Pio is himself an excellent trumpet player.) Most of Ed''s China tour arrangements were made through one person, the owner of a wholesale/retail travel agency located in San Francisco, California. Over the years these two travel agency owners came to respect each other highly, becoming good friends.
Last year (1999), Ed Pio decided to try to create new music exchange programs with China, via a subsidiary he created called Global Music Exchange. (As manager of the Watsonville Community Band for the past 30 years, he has taken them to performances in many far-flung areas of the world, and has also taken high school bands and instrumental jazz groups on many foreign tours.) Looking for participation of Chinese Government agencies, to create arts programs in China that would result in "invitations" to U.S. arts groups, he sent proposals to several business contacts in China. Literally nothing happened. He was told that what he was suggesting would take several years in the bureaucratic process, and was not worth the effort.
In frustration, he contacted his Chinese friend in San Francisco, asking if he could or would help. Within two months this friend had arranged for a written invitation from the Vice Governor of one of China's largest provinces, Hebei Province, for one of the suggested programs. In amazement, Ed asked his friend how he was able to do this in such a short time. His answer: "through my friends."
Ed has since learned more about "friends" and doing business in China. Ed and his San Francisco friend visited China in June of 2000. Ed was introduced many times to those in federal, provincial, municipal government, and in business, always with the emphasis that "Ed had been a friend for ten years." The "friends" that Ed was introduced to had been friends of his San Francisco contact for over twenty years. Talk about an "old friend network!" After a week of dinners and discussions, Ed was accepted by these governmental and business contacts as someone to be trusted; in his next trip to China, he has been invited to bring several musician friends of his that he has known well for years, and introduce THEM... and hopefully, by the end of the week or so of contact, these new persons (barbershoppers!) will also be accepted conditionally into the "friend network."
The main focus of Ed's presentations and discussions over the two weeks he spent in China in June were centered around the project of bringing six to eight high school marching bands to China for the first-ever "American Youth in China Invitational High School Band Competition and Tour," in March of 2001. To fund this, Ed is currently recruiting eight non-competitive corporations to provide scholarship funding for the students in these bands. In his presentations in China, Ed showed three brief videos. One was of his Watsonville Community Band, performing for President Clinton at the White House (a good way to establish credentials!) The second was of several high-school marching bands. Then, to test the waters regarding barbershop, Ed showed a video with segments from "Voices," segments from the 1999 Anaheim SPEBSQSA chorus competition tape, and -- from the previous month's Alaska Cruise Chorus -- segments of several songs, including "Home on the Range."
Well, the reaction to the barbershop was MUCH more than hoped for. Both the past governor and the present vice governor of Hebei Provence, who were at separate presentations, became very excited when they viewed that third tape about barbershop. Through their interpreters they each described the many state-sponsored community choirs (membership is mixed, and SATB) which exist in Hebei Province. Both of them have strongly supported the community choirs politically; they were very interested in those choruses having an opportunity to learn something new. Ed offered to bring over people who would be able to demonstrate and teach the choir directors about 4-part harmony. They have offered to cover most of our expenses once those teachers arrived in China.
Aha, sounds like the perfect opportunity for SPEBSQSA or Sweet Adelines to step in, with their excellently organized and highly talented teaching teams. But there we ran into another "Great Wall" of China -- twofold. Ed was told that they were (a) only interested in something that their entire mixed choir could sing, similar to what they had seen on the video tape, and (b) the "teachers" should be somebody who was a long-time friend of Ed's. FRUSTRATION! Well, Ed figured that maybe they THOUGHT that they were interested in only mixed barbershop music now, but that they'd soon "catch the bug" and want to expand into all-male and all-female choruses. But for now, and the "first contact," who could he introduce as a long-time friend? Fortunately Ed has worked with the Orloffs for many years, so that was a start, but their forte really isn't teaching music...
The general plan, as it is currently being developed, is:
How will all of this be funded? Through Global Music Exchange (a division of Edward Pio Associates), the eight corporate sponsorships for the high school marching bands will be extended to also cover the barbershop education. (The corporate proposals read: "The majority of the sponsorship funds will be allocated as scholarships for high school band students to participate in the first-ever American Youth in China Invitational High School Band Competition and Tour in March, 2001. Sponsorship funds will also be used to support the presentation and teaching of Barbershop 4-part harmony singing in Chinese cities and communities."
STAY TUNED... WE'LL UPDATE THIS WITH MORE DETAILS AS THINGS PROGRESS.