Gwen (Artist / Independent Curator): I hope to explore not only the meaning of the sound of the gong and drum in Kunqu Opera, but also to understand the history of Shanghai from this starting point. Upon returning today and walking along the Suzhou River, I hear the sound of rain, the sound of traffic. If we ignore these sounds and treat them, like continuous background noise or become numb to it. Are we destined to lose a part of our city’s narrative or historical memory? To me, sound is not only for making music, it is also a signifier, just like the gong and drum in Kunqu Opera, which we engaged with in our research. In the opera performance, it is more than just a sound for accompaniment. It goes beyond the medium of sound. Perhaps, it will become a language of its own. An image, or music. When all of these come together, different sounds would become part of the narrative. When I am thinking about how to modernize something. I have to firstly, thoroughly understand its heritage and essence. So, I think that tracing back to the origin is a vital process in my research of creative work. Along the process, many meaningful details will gradually unravel and reveal themselves. For example, I know that gong and drum in Kun Qu is tightly connected to the local language or dialect.

Chris NG (Musician / Conductor / Music Scholar): I met Gwen when I was in university. She studied Ethnomusicology in Hawaii’s university. Although she came from a background of Western music, she already showed a strong interest for Chinese music from her earlier stage. We collaborated extensively. We had a music ensemble that featured a piano duet in combination with Kunqu gong and drum. These were all her ideas. We had chosen to perform Piazzolla’s Le Grand Tango which was a very western piece of Argentine music and the addition of the Kunqu gong and drum created an interesting resonance.

Gwen Kam: This is Shun Pao newspaper in the 30s, or even earlier, the Dianshizhai Pictorial in the Late Qing period, included many images that recorded these participants in

a state of performing and working. I also wish to use woodblock printing, the earliest newspaper production method in the old days to do the printing. If I use woodblock printing, even if the sound, given its nature, cannot be taken away from this venue. The images that it has produced and its visual impressions can still be carried forward to and be passed on through the woodblock.

Chris NG: In recent years, she has made a lot of attempts to work across different disciplines as the curator. She tried extracting many elements of Kunqu, for example, sound, and rhythm, etc, taking them out of the traditional stages, musical halls, or theatres and moving them to more extensive and fluid spaces. So that more people can learn about Kunqu. This was an excellent way of re-activating the Kunqu.

Gwen Kam: I’ll do it step by step. It’s not that I can’t see a future. It’s because I don’t want to impose a restrictive end to it, or say I must get to somewhere or pass it on some way. I think for many occasions, if you could keep your mind open, you would come across with new opportunities and find the way out.

Listening with no limits

Resonance lasts forever