Matías Tarnopolsky, American Musicians Are Doing Something Profound in Beijing Right Now, Nov. 16, 2023.
While presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping were drawing the world’s attention for their talks in San Francisco this week, a different kind of summitry is happening in China. There, representatives from their two countries are speaking through violins, cellos, oboes and clarinets.
I write from Beijing, almost exactly 50 years after the Philadelphia Orchestra arrived as the first American orchestra to perform in China in a key moment of Ping-Pong diplomacy. I traveled there to be ...