In the past winter vacation, Peiyang Chorus won the gold medal in the 2023 Brahms International Chorus Festival with the highest score in Brahms Portfolio Group. Sun Chenyu, the chorus conductor, won the Best Conductor Award.

Johannes Brahms, a famous German composer in 19th century, was known as the "Three Masters of German Classical Music" together with Bach and Beethoven. 2023 is the 190th anniversary of Brahms’s birth. To memorize this great composer, the Municipal Government of Mirtschuschrag,in Austria and the World Organization for Promoting Music and Arts Education jointly held the festival which attracted 170 choruses from 24 countries in total.

Guided by director Ren Baoping, Wen Yuchuan and Haoyin, Sun Chenyu, the assistant conductor led the Peiyang Chorus and performed one of Brahms’s works -- Sehnsucht. The performance was recorded and sent to the competition committee. After fifteen days’ review by international expert group, Peiyang Chorus was granted the highest score in Brahms Portfolio Group and won the gold medal.

“As a non-professional college choir from Asia, it is such a great honor for us to obtain international recognition with a German work in Brahms’s hometown. We are very excited and much encouraged!” said Wen Yuchuan, the Peiyang Chorus’s standing conductor, “This achievement wouldn’t have been made without our university’s long-lasting tradition of art education and strong humanistic campus culture.”

Peiyang Chorus traces its origin back to a hundred years ago when it was then called Peiyang University Choir. Nowadays, it has become a high-level college art group that has participated multiple international art competitions on behalf of the country. As the gold award winners of many international chorus competitions, the chorus was granted with the honorary title of "World Choir" by the International Choir Union.

By Zheng Xilong

Editor: Eva Yin