Wang Xunzhi

Wang Xunzhi was born in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, in 1899. From 1921 he studied the fifteen-string Hangzhou zheng with Jiang Yinchun, a noted Hangzhou silk-and-bamboo player, and in 1925 he became music instructor of the Jiande ensemble of the Shanghai Savings Society, remaining active in Shanghai's traditional-music societies for many years. In 1956 he was engaged by the East China branch of the Central Conservatory (later the Shanghai Conservatory of Music) to teach zheng and sanxian in its Chinese music department. With his students he wrote zheng teaching materials, edited Zhejiang-school pieces such as The Moon on High, The Falcon Seizes the Crane and The General's Command, and guided the trial building of a 21-string S-shaped zheng in 1958. His students included Sun Wenyan, Xiang Sihua and Fan Shang'e, and through them the Zhejiang school took its modern form. He died in 1972.