Begining erhu in Brisbane, Australia

[fish]

Hi everyone,

I've kinda had this interest in the erhu for quite some time now.
So far I've found a shop here that supposedly sells erhus (although I haven't had the time to go down to their shop yet), otherwise I know of a friend who could maybe help me get one from china.

Anyway, I've been trying to find any form of instruction (more precisely a teacher, school or class in the area) but google and this site's search haven't yeilded anything (maybe wrong search terms?) and flipping though the yellowpages hasn't yeilded anything obvious yet... but anyway, I was wondering if anyone know of a teacher in brisbane?

or if not, maybe which guides/books/vids are recommended?

Thanks!

[Charlie Huang]

I think teaching material is your best option because I don't think there is a large base of Chinese music players down under. Even here in ol' Blighty, there's only a few and none close to me.

I'm sure someone else on here will give you more help than moi.

[davidmdahl]

Welcome to our forum, Fish! I am not in any position to know of erhu teachers in Australia, but maybe the following will help. Check at local universities and colleges that have a music department. An ethnomusicology department might provide some useful contacts. I also suggest looking for Chinese civic and cultural organizations. They may not list much of anything on the Internet, or not have much to do with music specifically, but it will help if you can find people who know the Chinese community in your area.

If there are Chinese cultural fairs and celebrations in your area, that would be a good opportunity to do some networking. Maybe you will even get lucky and someone will perform on erhu. Even someone who plays another instrument such as guzheng may know of a erhu player/teacher.

I have not found any videos or books that really replace an erhu teacher, at least for English-only speakers. There are a few video clips on the Internet, some of which are listed in an other thread on the erhu section.

If you find a music teacher for another Chinese instrument, you may find it worthwhile to take that opportunity, while you continue your search for an erhu teacher. The study of any major Chinese instrument will introduce you to the styles, tunes, notation, and the musicians to play the music. If you already know something about Chinese music before starting to study the erhu, that will be a big advantage.

Good luck!

Best wishes,

David

[calden]

Fish:

Welcome to this group.

For a resourcem, try the Australian Chinese Music Ensemble:

home.vicnet.net.au/~aaf/ting3.htm

They're located in Melbourne it seems, and if you can give them a call someone there might be able to tell you who's doing the sawin' in Brisbane.

Carlos

[davidbadagnani]

Thanks, that's a great website. I think the sheng player Wang Zheng-Ting used to run a Chinese ensemble in Australia, and another famous scholar named Yang Mu was there a while back as well.

Searching through their site brought me to this interesting site about a pair of Vietnamese musician/composers in Australia who do a lot of cross-cultural collaborations with gamelan and other styles. The music is very interesting.
home.vicnet.net.au/~aaf/listen.htm