The Han people are China’s most prominent ethnic group, consisting of more than ninety percent of the population. The Chinese government refers to the remaining ten percent, as Minzu–nationalities or minorities. The Minzu population consists of fifty-five ethnicities, each with its own distinct music and cultural traditions. Minzu people and the Chinese government have made valiant efforts to highlight the cultural distinctions of ethnic minorities through its educational institutions and government-sponsored cultural centers. In October 2015, ethnomusicologist Lester Monts led a group videographers to universities and music conservatories in Beijing, Shenyang, and Anshan, and the Splendid China Folk Village to capture samples of music and dance of China’s ethnic minorities. This presentation is part of an on-going project to capture Chinese Minzu music on film; it provides a wonderful contrast to the “high” art music that is generally known to Western audiences.

(Image: A Miao gong performance, using a metal bucket as a moving resonator)

Biography

Lester Monts is an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Music (ethnomusicology). For twenty-one years, he served as the UM senior vice provost for academic affairs. With Dr. Louis Yen, he negotiated with Chinese officials to establish the Confucius Institute at the University of Michigan. He is currently director of the Michigan Musical Heritage Project that seeks to capture on film the state’s folk, ethnic, and immigrant music traditions, and he is director-designate of the Stearns Musical Instrument Collection. As a senior consultant to the Chinese Language Council International (Hanban), he has traveled throughout China and has been awarded six honorary professorships from Chinese universities and music conservatories. His work on musical heritage has now carried over to China where he has begun to collect film data on the music of China’s ethnic minorities.