Conductor
指揮
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Chunhe Zhang張椿和
Chunhe Zhang is a National First-Class Conductor, member of the Chinese Musicians Association, and an alumnus of the Central Conservatory of Music and the European Masterclass for Conducting. Trained under acclaimed masters including Liangkun Yan and Herbert Von Zipper, he previously served as chief conductor of the Tianjin Opera and Dance Theatre Orchestra. Since relocating to the United States in 1998, Maestro Zhang has served as Artistic Director and Conductor for both the Xiangyin Chorus and the Edison Philharmonic Orchestra. Throughout his distinguished career, he has spearheaded monumental choral projects across the globe. Highlights include directing two 100-singer performances of the "Yellow River Cantata" in 2015, conducting a 1,000-member mass chorus at the 2023 World Culture Festival in Washington, D.C., and leading cross-Atlantic collaborations at Lincoln Center in 2025. In August 2026, he conducted the Xiangyin Chinese Chorus at the world-renowned Golden Hall of the Musikverein in Vienna. Renowned for his modesty and profound artistry, Zhang is well-versed in both international classical repertoire and contemporary Chinese works. His conducting style—passionate yet measured, delicate yet spontaneous—continues to earn him widespread global acclaim.
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Bowed Strings
拉弦
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Wen-jie xia夏文杰
Erhu/Banhu/Gaohu | 二胡/板胡/高胡 Wen-jie Xia is the concertmaster of CMENY. Previously, he was the banhu soloist at the Shanghai Opera House and the principal player of the erhu, zhonghu, and gaohu in the orchestra. While in China, he was involved in operatic productions and has composed several works. In addition, he has won several prizes in solo competitions. He graduated from the School of the Shanghai Traditional Orchestra.
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Feifei yang楊飛飛
Erhu/Banhu/Gaohu | 二胡/板胡/高胡 Feifei Yang is a virtuoso on the Erhu and Banhu and a vocalist. She is a dual Global Music Award Winner. She has performed in legendary settings such as the United Nations, Abu Dhabi Palace, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Barclays Center, CBS, WNBC, and others. She has performed for the eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon, the Rockefeller’s, Steve Forbes, China’s President and the First Lady. Her singles and albums include You Will Never Be Alone, Heroic China, Love Will Win Again, Tug of War, Dance of the Strings, Gu•Ran, and China Caribe. She studied banhu at the Shenyang Conservatory of Music and was recognized with the honor of Outstanding Graduate Student of all of Liaoning province’s colleges. In 2007, she became the first master's recipient for banhu in the Conservatory’s history. She was the first place winner of the AWZG Chinese Young Artists Talent Selection and the Best Creativity Award winner in CCTV's “Chinese New Year Gala” US Talent Hunt. Feifei holds additional master's degrees in education from Adelphi University and arts and cultural management from the Pratt Institute. She is also a member of the Chinese Musician’s Association and Liaoning Traditional Chinese Orchestral Music Association.
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Inna Lu陸英娜
Erhu | 二胡 Inna Lu, a graduate of the Shanghai Theatre Academy, is an eminent erhu soloist. She gained international acclaim when she performed at the 2015 Met Gala, themed "China: Through the Looking Glass," alongside Rihanna. Her talent has graced community events like the Lunar New Year event at the University of New Haven, prestigious venues like Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and Gramercy Theatre, and global events like New York Fashion Week and the United Nations, as well as the Consulate General of the People's Republic of China in New York. She serves as the erhu soloist for a unique rock band, and their album is available on multiple music streaming platforms. In addition, she has won the first place award in several solo competitions.
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Hina Zhang張日妮
Erhu | 二胡 Hina Zhang, born and raised in Japan, stared her professional erhu training at the age of 4. She has participated in many concerts, performed on television, collaborated with symphonic orchestras, and is known for playing violin music using the erhu. Since 2017, Zhang has been a Special Cultural Ambassador of Japan. She performed in the 2021 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting at Davos, the 2023 China-Japan 50th Anniversary of Normalization, and the 2023 Bund Global Financial Summit in Shanghai. She graduated with a bachelor's of music in classical voice from the Manhattan School of Music and studied marketing and business administration at NYU. Over the years, she traveled back to China to receive professional erhu education from the Central Conservatory of Music Prep School and under the guidance of Fei Song.
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Danting Qiao喬丹婷
Erhu | 二胡 Danting Qiao is the former concertmaster of the Peking University Chinese Orchestra. She studied arts administration at Baruch College.
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Chia-yu Joy Lu呂家玗
Erhu/Zhonghu | 二胡/中胡 Chia-Yu Joy Lu 呂家玗, a multifaceted and accomplished musician and scholar from Taiwan, is renowned for her expertise in erhu and zhonghu performance, as well as ensemble directing. With performances across the globe, including prestigious venues like Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and Yale University, Lu has dedicated over a decade to directing Chinese music ensembles. Before her US career, she led ensembles in Taiwan and has since directed the Wesleyan Chinese Music Ensemble for over ten years. Additionally, she played a pivotal role in establishing and leading the Smith College Chinese Music Ensemble and the New Haven Chinese Cultural Cooperative. Holding a PhD in ethnomusicology from Wesleyan University, an MA in ethnomusicology from the University of Sheffield, UK, and a BFA in erhu performance and music education from National Taiwan Normal University, Lu’s research delves into music, gender, national politics, and ethnic identity in Taiwan and China. She has authored a music textbook, erhu music scores, and albums, and her passion extends to collaborative endeavors where she blends Chinese music with diverse traditions such as Javanese gamelan, jazz, klezmer, classical music, and Taiwanese Opera. Committed to promoting traditional Chinese and Taiwanese music, Lu eagerly explores various artistic disciplines to broaden her horizons.
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He Tao
何濤
Gaohu/Erhu | 高胡/二胡（Guest Musician| 客座音樂家) He Tao, an acclaimed erhuist from Shanghai, began her studies under her father and trained for 11 years at Beijing’s Central Conservatory of Music with Professors Nie Jingyu and Xu Jiangde. She also studied piano, cello, and guzheng. After graduating in 1992, she joined the China Broadcast Chinese Orchestra as erhu and gaohu player, appearing as soloist in major concerts televised nationally, including Centennial Anniversary of A Bing and the Beijing International Arts Salon Festival. In 1999, she moved to Singapore as a contract artist with Expect Music, expanding her artistry into jazz and pop. Her albums Madam What’s Next and After Asians led to over 30 international concerts and coverage on Channel News Asia and CNBC. She also performed for Singapore’s Prime Minister at the P2000 Campaign Rally. From 2002, He joined the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra, featured in productions such as Urban Romanticism and Capering Notes. As a featured artist, she won acclaim on Hong Kong Radio’s Chamber Elegance program and collaborated widely as both performer and educator. Since immigrating to the U.S. in 2012, she has performed at Toronto’s Music Festival, Ivy League universities, Boston Chinese Ensemble’s 30th Anniversary, and Chicago’s Chinese Fine Arts Society Festival.
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*Names in this section are listed in alphabetical order by last name
Kevin Chen
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Anchi Lin
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Yongping Wu
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Plucked Strings
彈撥
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Hong-tao Sun孫洪濤
Pipa | 琵琶 Hong-Tao Sun is a distinguished musician and administrator. He graduated from the Music School of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music where he studied with the renowned pipa (pear-shaped lute) Master teachers Zhong-le Wei and Rong-Zhu Ying. From 1974-1991, he was a principal soloist when he worked at the Shanghai Dance Academy and performed with Shanghai Performing Arts Troupe until he came to the United States in 1991. Mr. Sun is the principal of the plucked string section of CMENY, represents the ensemble in many performances as a soloist, and teaches pipa in its educational programs. Mr. Sun has been the Executive Director of CMENY since 2011.
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Wei Sun孫薇
Guzheng | 古箏 Wei Sun is an award-winning artist and the principal guzheng player at CMENY. She is a national certified senior teacher of guzheng and a member of the Chinese National Instrumental Association and International Guzheng Association. Wei's innovative use of the seven-tone guzheng allows her to break the usual pentatonic limitations of traditional Chinese instruments. She came to the US as a guzheng performer and guzheng teacher at the CBA Cultural and Art Center in 2016. Sun has been invited to perform at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the United Nations, Pace University, Columbia University, Merkin Hall, Flushing Townhall, and Queens College Art Center, to name a few. She has also performed as part of the Broadway musical show "Noble Family". She studied music at the Communication University of China.
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Eugenie Chen陳玥駸
Zhongruan/Liuqin | 中阮/柳琴 Eugenie Chen is a classically trained ruan and liuqin artist. Born and raised in Shanghai, she started playing ruan at the age of five and liuqin at age nine. In 2007, Chen was invited by the China Central Television to record a solo performance of “A Remote Song” (幽远的歌声) for a program featuring top young musicians in the nation. Later that year, her ensemble Jin Qi (金豈组合) took first place in the National Classical Chinese Music Competition. She has performed at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and other venues both as a soloist and a collaborator. In 2015, she was invited to perform at the 2015 Met Gala themed "China: Through the Looking Glass" as a featured guest artist and shared a stage with Rihanna. She studied ruan and liuqin performance at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music under Professor Wu Qiang.
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Chengjin Koh高程錦
Yangqin | 揚琴 Chengjin Koh is an award-winning Singaporean composer and yangqin player at CMENY. As a yangqin player, she was one of the youngest grand prize winners of the Singapore Chinese Music Competition and performed as a soloist with the Singapore Chinese Orchestra at eighteen. As a composer, she seeks to transcend boundaries through the multicultural and interdisciplinary reinvention of musical meaning. She has worked with the Paris-based Ensemble InterContemporain, China Conservatory of Music, Singapore Chinese Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, Ding Yi Music Company, Verona Quartet, National Sawdust, Metropolis Ensemble, and New Thread Quartet, among others. Her accolades include the BMI Foundation Young Composer (William Schuman) Prize, an ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award, the Society of New Music Brian Israel Prize, Palmer Dixon Award and Gena Raps Chamber Music Prize (The Juilliard School), and the Boston New Music Initiative Prize. She was commissioned by the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art for their centennial celebration and was the commissioned composer for the Singapore International Violin Competition. Having completed her undergraduate and graduate studies at The Juilliard School, she is pursuing a doctorate in music composition at NYU.
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Zhou Yi周懿
Pipa | 琵琶 Praised by The Washington Post for her “breathtaking” technique and expressive artistry, Zhou Yi is a New York–based soloist of the pipa (Chinese lute) and qin (Chinese zither). A native of Shanghai, she began studying the pipa at age five and graduated from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. As a concert soloist, Zhou Yi has captivated audiences worldwide with her virtuosity and wide-ranging repertoire. Highlights include Tan Dun’s Concerto for Pipa and String Orchestra at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig; a Young People’s Concert with the New York Philharmonic; Bun-Ching Lam’s Sudden Thunder with the Sinfonieorchester Münster; Song of the Pipa with the Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra; and Sisters of the Grassland with the Youngstown Symphony Orchestra. Her guqin performing credits include appearances with the San Francisco Opera in Bright Sheng’s Dream of the Red Chamber, the Santa Fe Opera in Huang Ruo’s Dr. Sun Yat-sen, and the Lincoln Center Festival in Paradise Interrupted. An advocate for new music, she has premiered works by Xinyan Li, Jianbing Hu, Qian Zhou, and Du Yun at venues including Carnegie Hall, NEC’s Jordan Hall, and the Mata Festival. Dedicated to education and outreach, she has taught and lectured at Carnegie Hall’s Music Explorers program, Columbia University, and New York University. She served as a juror for the 2023 Astral National Competition and received New York City’s Outstanding Cultural Contribution Award for her impact on cultural exchange.
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*Names in this section are listed in alphabetical order by last name
Qinning Cao曹清宁
Pipa | 琵琶 Corrie Chen陳月婷
Yangqin | 揚琴 Victor Chen陳肇良
Liuqin/Zhongruan | 柳琴/中阮 Xinran Chen
陳欣然
Pipa | 琵琶 Siwei Gong龚思维
Pipa | 琵琶 Ran Guo果然
Daruan | 大阮 |
Zhaoshun Guo果兆順
Pipa | 琵琶 Xinyi Han韩馨逸
Zhongruan | 中阮 Xiuzhen Liang梁秀貞
Zhongruan | 中阮 Cong Liu劉聰
Guzheng | 古箏 Wei Wang王薇
Zhongruan | 中阮 Alice Wou Choey吳璧媛
Daruan | 大阮 |
Vanessa Wu吳新穎
Yangqin | 揚琴 Zhi Ping Yang鄔志萍
Yangqin | 揚琴 Yubo Zhang張宇博
Pipa | 琵琶 Guo-yun Zheng鄭國云
Pipa | 琵琶 |
Winds
管樂
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YuYuan Xu徐煜源
Bangdi/Qudi/Xindi/Xiao | 梆笛/曲笛/新笛/簫 Yuyuan Xu is a resident bamboo flute player at CMENY. He served in the Shanghai Beijing Opera Troupe for 27 years. Xu is also a resident artist and the flute instructor of the Kunqu Workshop and flute instructor at the New Jersey United Chinese School Music Ensemble. He is a graduate from the Department of Chinese Folk Music of the Shanghai Academy of Music, majoring in dizi (Chinese flute).
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Katelyn Weng翁夢昕
Bangdi/Qudi/Xiao/Hulusi | 梆笛/曲笛/簫/葫蘆絲 Katelyn Weng began her musical journey learning piano at the age of six and Chinese flute at the age of eight, studying under Mr. Yuyuan Xu. She became a member of CMENY in 2010. After winning first place in the Eastern Music category in the SINO-US International Campus Cultural Arts Festival in Beijing in 2011, she returned to attend the CCTV Colorful Gala in 2013. She is a graduate of Fiorello H. LaGuardia Arts High School in Manhattan and has a doctorate in pharmacy from St. John’s University.
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Zhisheng Zhang張志生
Alto Sheng | 笙 Zhisheng Zhang is a State First-Class Performer previously with the China Broadcasting Chinese Orchestra, a renowned sheng (traditional bamboo mouth organ) virtuoso, and a member of both the Chinese Musicians Association and the China Folk Orchestra Association. He serves as a special advanced examiner for national arts grading evaluations. A final disciple of the legendary sheng master Yan Haideng, Zhang has toured extensively across Europe, Asia, and the Americas, performing at prestigious venues including Vienna's Musikverein. His major recordings include "Springtime in the Three Villages" (1980) and "A Peacock in His Pride" (1994), released on CD by Hong Kong Long Ying Company. In 1995, Zhang won the Excellent Performance Award at the International Chinese Instrumental Solo Competition for his premiere of "Spring Tide." His major international guest appearances include hosting a demonstrative symposium concert in Taiwan (1999), performing the concerto "Wind Sound" with South Korea's Pusan National Orchestra (2001), and premiering "High Speed Thinking" for the Boston Musicians Association (2017). He was invited to the U.S. for a lecture tour in 2004 and remains an active performer across both the East and West coasts.
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*Names in this section are listed in alphabetical order by last name
Jeff FairbankTenor Suona | 中音嗩呐 Hongyu Gu谷泓毅
Qudi | 曲笛 HangSheng Huang黃杭升
Bangdi | 梆笛 |
Tong Kong孔童
Qudi | 曲笛 Jia Nan賈楠
Alto Suona | 高音嗩呐 GUANJUN Qi齊冠鈞
Qudi | 曲笛 |
mingze tang唐銘澤
Sheng | 笙 Jouan Yu余祐安
Qudi | 曲笛 |
Percussion
打擊樂
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William PengCheng Yuan袁鵬程
Percussion/Yangqin |打擊樂/揚琴 William Pengcheng Yuan is the principal percussionist of the Chinese Music Ensemble of New York. He has performed at many acclaimed venues, such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and Merkin Hall and is a highly respected yangqin (Chinese hammer dulcimer) and percussion teacher in the New York and New Jersey areas for over 20 years. Yuan is a graduate of the Tianjin Conservatory of Music, majoring in yangqin.
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*Names in this section are listed in alphabetical order by last name
ADRIENNE GAU
高藇安
Percussion/Yangqin | 打擊樂/揚琴 GRACE GOSS
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Jessica Lin
林惠芳
Percussion | 打擊樂 lU Ye
葉露
Percussion | 打擊樂 Qing-ze Wang
王清澤
Percussion | 打擊樂 |
Shawn Wu
吳成翔
Percussion | 打擊樂 |