The UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance will present a night of exquisite cuisine and captivating performances atCrescendo 2011 on October 22nd at the Hyatt Regency Crown Center Hotel. The enchanting evening will feature student and faculty performances, and all proceeds will support Conservatory student scholarships. Anne and Howard Elsberry will serve as the honorary chairmen, and Lisa Schellhorn and Don Dagenais are the co-chairmen.

One of the scintillating performances that evening will be excerpts from Madame White Snake, an opera by Zhou Long, UMKC Conservatory research professor of music composition. Cerise Lim Jacobs, a first time librettist and a retired Boston attorney; wrote the text. Zhou Long was awarded the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for music for the opera.A few years back, Gil Rose, the conductor at Opera Boston; contacted Zhou Long and his wife, violinist and composer Chen Yi, aUMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance professor; about writing the music for Madame White Snake. Chen Yi  already had a commission, so Zhou Long worked on it with Cerise for three years. Madame White Snake is based on the classic Chinese folk tale about a snake who transforms into a woman so that she can experience love. It premiered with Opera Boston at the Cutler Majestic Theatre on February 26, 2010. Madame White Snake also was co-produced by the Beijing Music Festival Arts Foundation and was performed in China last fall. In addition, it will be presented by the Washington National Opera at the Kennedy Center’s China Festival on September 21st. In the future, Zhou Long hopes to see Madame White Snake produced in its entirety in Our Town, either through the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance or the Lyric Opera.

A few years back, Gil Rose, the conductor at Opera Boston; contacted Zhou Long and his wife, violinist and composer Chen Yi, aUMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance professor; about writing the music for Madame White Snake. Chen Yi  already had a commission, so Zhou Long worked on it with Cerise for three years. Madame White Snake is based on the classic Chinese folk tale about a snake who transforms into a woman so that she can experience love. It premiered with Opera Boston at the Cutler Majestic Theatre on February 26, 2010. Madame White Snake also was co-produced by the Beijing Music Festival Arts Foundation and was performed in China last fall. In addition, it will be presented by the Washington National Opera at the Kennedy Center’s China Festival on September 21st. In the future, Zhou Long hopes to see Madame White Snake produced in its entirety in Our Town, either through the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance or the Lyric Opera.

When the Pulitzer Prize was announced in April, Zhou Long was taking a nap that afternoon. Chen Yi woke him up to say that the calls were coming in. “Friends left short messages, and I didn’t know what was happening. I went on the Internet, and I saw the Pulitzer announcement with my name next to it. It was exciting. I really didn’t expect this,” said Zhou Long. He is proud of the fact that he is the first Asian American to win the Pulitzer Prize in music. In addition, it has been close to 50 years since a full-length opera has been awarded a Pulitzer.

It has been quite a journey for Zhou Long, from his life in Beijing to the academic realm at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance and winning the Pulitzer Prize. He was born in Beijing to an artistic family. His mother was a singer and a teacher at the Central Conservatory of Music. His father was a painter and taught at the China National Drama Academy. Zhou Long began taking piano lessons at an early age. During the Cultural Revolution, he was sent to a state farm while he was a teenager, where he drove a tractor for three years. The roaring wind and the frigid conditions made a lasting impression. At times he and his fellow workers were even forced to defend the Chinese border against the Soviet army. “This harsh environment gave me a sense of profound spirituality, and I never lost hope,” said Zhou Long.

In 1973, he resumed his musical education, studying composition, music theory and conducting, along with traditional Chinese music. In 1978, it was announced on the radio that the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing was reopening. Zhou Long enrolled in the first composition class, where he met his future wife Chen Yi. After graduating in 1983, he became the composer-in-residence with the National Broadcasting Symphony Orchestra in China. He also married Chen Yi. “The school didn’t allow couples to marry. We were supposed to concentrate on our studies.”

In 1985, he was awarded a fellowship to attend Columbia University and received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in 1993. Chen Yi was teaching at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University when she was recruited to the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance in 1998. Zhou Long remained in Brooklyn where he lectured at Brooklyn College and was a free-lance composer. In 2001, Chen Yi was the recipient of the Charles Ives Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and Zhou Long temporarily taught in her place at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance. He has had a teaching position there ever since.

Zhou Long gets along well with his colleagues and is proud of the international student body at UMKC. He also has enjoyed watching Our Town grow culturally and is looking forward to the opening of the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. Despite his new-found fame, he likes living in a calm, mid-sized city. “I have no plans to go anywhere else,” Zhou Long said.

Also featured in the September 3rd issue of The Independent

Zhou Long, 2011 Pulitzer Prize winner for music and composer of the opera Madame White Snake, which will be featured at Crescendo