This week, Ritva is challenging everyone to think Music on Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #416.

Confession time: I have never been to any kind of live musical concert. Actually, I don’t know if I have. Does being part of the concert count? I was in choir when I was in high school and part of my grade was to participate in the concerts. I don’t think that’s the same as experiencing the concert in the audience.

I’m trying to think if I heard any sort of live music while I was in China and to be honest, I missed listening to music while I was there. I wasn’t able to access Amazon Music while I was there, not even with a VPN, and when I could, I could only play around 3 songs before the internet stopped working. I have been listening to music ever since I’ve been home and it feels so good. Anyway, I can think of only a few occasions where I heard some sort of live music during the trip.

The first time was while my mom, her cousins M and T, and I were having lunch at a franchise restaurant in Nanjing. As I waited for the food to come, suddenly, I heard music in the background. “Where is it coming from?” I asked my mom and she pointed behind me.

On the stage, the lady in the red dress began to sing in a high operaic pitch while she played the traditional Chinese instrument. Even though she sang slowly, I couldn’t understand the words as Mandarin is not my primary language. I can speak it alright and can understand everyday sentences but that’s about it. Poetry and technical things, forget it, ask someone else.

In Suzhou, I was walking along the river in the village of Mudu when this boat rowed by. As it went by, I saw the boat operator was wearing a microphone. I thought it was so she could introduce the sights to her passengers but then she started singing acapella in the same high pitch voice I heard in the restaurant in Nanjing. Do everyone sing in such a high pitch voice in China? I’ve always thought people sang like that in operas.

Finally, I saw this antique grand piano in the Broadway Mansions Hotel in Shanghai. This piano was created in 1932 and it took 3 months of land and sea travels to arrive in this hotel from Germany. Imagine all the music it’s made, all the history it’s been through, and I was told that it still plays, just need a little bit of tuning.