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The on-going Beijing Ninegates Jazz Festival is bringing together jazz masters from both at home and abroad. On Monday night it was Rony Holan from Israel, who got the chance to showed off his skills in the Forbidden City Concert Hall.
The sticks were handled with consummate ease and grace, as the Israeli king of the drums, Rony Holan, presented his original composition inspired by the book "The Prophet" by Lebanese poet, Khalil Gibran.
Holan paid homage in his own syncopated way.
This was Holan's first visit to China. Thanks to the Ninegates Jazz Festival, the virtuoso drummer finally got to meet some of the readers of the Chinese version of his book: "Rhythm For All", a bible for would be drummers.
Rony Holan said, "I think it's a great festival, and a great place. The Chinese people are very kind and nice. I hope it's the beginning of a new story, you know. I wish to come again."
The Ninegates Jazz Festival not only offers a chance for jazz fans to enjoy foreign musicians, but also provides an international stage for Chinese jazz musicians to communicate with their foreign peers. Xia Jia, is a jazz pianist and leader of the Beijing City Jazz Orchestra.
Xiajia, jazz pianist, said, "In the previous jazz festivals, we were extremely excited to see those big names in the circle who are really hard to be seen in China. I was once quite excited about that, and even thought that it was the real point of the festival. But now I've found that home grown bands are getting stronger very quickly, and it's a trend that will continue. So thanks to this event you can see how far local jazz musicians have progressed to date."
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