Founded in Vancouver in 1991, the ensemble pioneered the kind of Chinese-Western musical fusions that one now hears in acts ranging from The Sparrow Quartet to Yo Yo Ma’s Silk Road project. It has blended Chinese folk and classical music with Celtic, Latin, Arabic, Aboriginal, jazz, and blues music. It developed two exciting educational programs to bring world music to school children, and in 2001, it created a groundbreaking recording and performance project that paired Chinese and European-Canadian vocalists for bilingual duets of Chinese folk songs. Along the way, it earned a Juno nomination, two West Coast Music Awards, two Canadian Folk Music Award nominations, and countless enthusiastic reviews. Most recently, Silk Road Music has turned its attention to “sinified” flamenco music, performing on stage with flamenco dancers and engaging in an extended study period in Spain.

At the heart of Silk Road Music is the unstoppable artistic vision of its founder, Qiu Xia He (Pr. Chu-sha Her), a one-time music teacher at China’s Xian Academy of Music and one-time professional pipa player with the Shaanxi Music and Dance troupe. While performing with the troupe at the Vancouver Folk Music Festival, Qiu Xia made a dramatic decision to stay in Canada and was welcomed by a household of Irish musician on Hornby Island. It was here that the seeds of her extraordinary cross-cultural musical experimentations were planted.

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