Hua Yanjun

Also known as A Bing

Hua Yanjun, known as A Bing, was born in 1893 in the Leizun Hall of the Dongxu Temple in Wuxi, Jiangsu. He learned Daoist ritual music from the hall's head priest Hua Qinghe and became skilled on erhu, pipa and flute. After Hua Qinghe's death he took over the priestly post; around 1928 he lost his sight and from then on made his living playing on the streets of Wuxi. In September 1950 Yang Yinliu and Cao Anhe recorded six of his pieces in Wuxi: the erhu works Erquan yingyue, Tingsong and Hanchunfeng qu, and the pipa works Dalang taosha, Longchuan and Zhaojun chusai. He died in Wuxi that December.