The two nations represented in this one-off concert were China and Scotland, with Dong Yi and Eddie McGuire as representatives. McGuire opened with a Burns medley and other pieces, including some of his own composition, on the classical flute. He then took up the bamboo flute for some pieces inspired by the Edinburgh pandas. Dong Yi took over on the zheng, a Chinese zither. The second piece, ‘Dancing Bells’, was particularly haunting. Back to the bamboo flute for 2 more pieces before ‘Spring Dawn on Snowy Mountain’, which was the highlight of the solo pieces. For some reason the programme did not reflect the concert given but the notes in it were very helpful.
Between the pieces both performers gave excellent explanations of the performance and of the history of the musical interaction between the two nations starting from the early 1980s: these concerts have been going in Edinburgh for 10 years. Sadly it was 55 minutes into the hour-long concert before they played a piece together, making an overrun inevitable. As this appeared to be the purpose of the concert, the duets came far too late, although the collaborations themselves were excellent. The first two, ‘Woman’s Heart’ and the excellent ‘River of Love’ were Chinese pieces. Following this were ‘Ye banks and braes’ and ‘Auld Lang Syne’. Apparently the latter is often played in China. Limiting the Scottish side of the collaborative items to lowland Burns was a missed opportunity to share the true Gaelic culture but overall this was a taste of what the Fringe can offer: sitting in on artistic exploration.
