[Another episode in Tourism, the series. Other parts here]
On this summer day in Xi’an, the old plaque in the BJS studios was again sounding overly cynical.
Tourist, n. One who favors packaged over live, who inches squeamishly past the teeming fauna of his own backyard — with its outrageous comedies, its epic contests, its tawdry intrigues — in order to reach the specimen cabinet at his neighbor’s place.
After all, one of the pleasures of a Chinese park is the music. You don’t have to travel to get music in the park, of course, any Beijing park worthy of the name will have a group of folks engaged in the making of it. The voices and instruments may be a bit rickety, but it’s not bloviating or shānzhài (山寨 = faked / knock-off), and that’s kind of lovely in itself.
Here’s the music:
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And the artists:
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