A concert commemorating the 130th birthday of Russia-born Jewish composer Aaron Avshalomov (1894-1964) was staged at the Shanghai Symphony Hall on Sept 12. Conducted by the grandson of the Russian composer, David Avshalomov, the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra opened the evening with his best-known piece, a tone poem named Peiping Hutongs.

The audience was treated to a unique auditory feast, including familiar tunes from the Beijing Opera, the bustle of a street marketplace, and even a solemn funeral procession

Peiping Hutongs is widely recognized as one of Aaron Avshalomov's most iconic works. In 2017, the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra performed this piece in Switzerland at the Lucerne Festival, one of the top international classical music festivals.

Aaron was born in Siberia, Russia in 1894 and came to China in 1918. He lived in Beijing for several years, then settled in Shanghai in 1929, where he enjoyed a prolific music career until moving to the United States to join his family in 1947.

He created a synthesis of Chinese musical elements and western orchestra composition techniques, including several operas based on Chinese folklore and historical figures, such as Kuan Yin, The Twilight Hour of Yan Kuei Fei, and The Great Wall.

Many of his important works premiered in Shanghai, winning high praise from local critics. The Great Wall, for example, was sponsored by Soong Ching-ling and Soong Mei-ling and highly praised by leading figures in the literary and art scene, such as Mei Lanfang, Xia Yan, and Fei Mu.

In 1935, Aaron orchestrated the theme song for a movie about the Chinese people's fight against Japanese aggression. This made him the first person to orchestrate what would become the national anthem of the People's Republic of China - March of the Volunteers.

Aaron's son Jacob was born in Tsingtao (now Qingdao, a city in Shandong province) in 1919, and spent most of his childhood in Shanghai. He returned to the United States with his mother in December 1937. Jacob studied composition and became a composer in the US.

His most important work was with the Portland Youth Philharmonic, where he conducted for 44 years. The orchestra was "for a long time the best youth orchestra in the United States, maybe in the world," David said about his late father, who died in 2013.

Jacob compiled his correspondence with his father while he was in China and wrote a family biography called Avshalomov's Winding Way: Composers out of China, a Chronicle, published in 2008.

People familiar with Jacob described him as a person "speaking Chinese with a standard Beijing accent" and "a pillar of the city (Portland)'s cultural life.”

"This double autobiography assembles the letters of Aaron with a narrative by Jacob to tell in their own words how two very different people overcame daunting obstacles and brought great music to appreciative audiences in China and America," reads a review by George Alderson on Amazon.

Through music, the family linkage with China extended to David. 

David's interpretation on Sept 12 was praised by Professor Tao Xin of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music as "filled with longing and strong emotions." Tao also praised the second piece Violin Concerto in D, featuring soloist Liu Ming, concert mistress of SSO. He wrote in his review the next day, "With her superb techniques and delicate musicality, Liu Ming and the orchestra presented the glory, joy and peacefulness of traditional Chinese culture".

Prior to the concert, David visited the Pathe Villa, the former venue of Pathe Recordings in Shanghai, where his grandfather Aaron used to work and the first recording of the March of the Volunteers was made.

To prepare for the concert, David said he spent hundreds of hours reading history books and listening to old soundtracks, especially the version recorded in 1937, where his grandfather might have been at the recording site.

He also said he was moved by the Chinese people who knew his grandfather and described him as a kind and generous person.