Piano educator Zhou Guangren died peacefully at home in Beijing at 16:30 on March 7 at the age of 93, and she was hailed as "the soul of piano education in China".
Zhou Guangren is the first pianist in New China to win an international competition and a tenured professor at the Central Conservatory of Music. She has been named "World Outstanding Woman" by the Cambridge International Biography Centre in the United Kingdom, and has also won the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Golden Bell Awards for Chinese Music.
Zhou Guangren was born in 1928 in Hanover, Germany. Her father studied in Hanover as a doctorate in mechanical engineering. At the age of 4, Zhou Guangren returned to China with his parents and settled in Shanghai. She began learning to play the piano at the age of 10 and took the stage at the age of 15 to play Mozart's Piano Concerto in A major.
However, her father wanted her to become a diplomat and had refused to provide her with a monthly tuition fee. At that time, Zhou Guangren studied under the Italian pianist and conductor Mei Baiqi, and the tuition fee was $20 per month. Therefore, Zhou Guangren gave piano lessons to 20 students every month to make up for the tuition and continue to learn the piano.
In 1951, at the age of 23, Zhou Guangren was selected as a member of the Chinese Youth Cultural and Labor Troupe and went to Berlin to participate in the Third World Youth Students' Peace and Friendship Gala. This is the first time since the founding of New China that a large-scale art group has been sent to participate in a worldwide art performance event.
Shortly after arriving in Germany, Zhou Guangren was temporarily told that she needed to participate in a piano competition, when she had no time to prepare, and had to choose four pieces that she usually trained to rush to the stage, including Bach's "Italian Concerto", Chopin's "Narrative First", Rachmaninoff's "Musical Moments" and He Luting's "Shepherd Boy Piccolo". With fluent skills and understanding of music, Zhou Guangren won the third place, becoming the first Chinese pianist to win an award in an international piano competition after the founding of New China.
The piano has brought Zhou Guangren honor and trauma. In May 1982, zhou Guangren was helping to move a grand piano when one of the legs was accidentally broken. To protect the piano, the ring finger of her right hand was smashed on the spot, and the middle and little fingers were blurred with blood and flesh. After the operation, Zhou Guangren's ring finger was forever shortened.
But that didn't get Zhou Guangren off the piano. In order to restore the function of his fingers, Zhou Guangren endured severe pain and insisted on playing the piano, and after a full year of injury, he miraculously reappeared on the stage. Until the age of 90, this "piano fanatic" still practiced every day.
Over the years, Zhou Guangren has served as a judge in major international piano competitions such as the Van Claiborne International Piano Competition and the Leeds International Piano Competition. She devoted her life to piano teaching, and trained a number of outstanding pianists such as Ni Hongjin, Li Baoqiong, Wu Yinan, Dan Zhaoyi, Yang Yunlin, Li Feilan and so on.
In 1994, Zhou Guangren participated in the establishment of the "China International Piano Competition" which integrates high standards, authority and internationality, and was elected as the chairman of the jury. This competition has become one of the most authoritative and influential international competitions in China, and has improved China's international status in the field of piano.