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A musical connection formed in 1985 continues through a new generation of Chinese and American students_我的网站

胡雪岩

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The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GTThe concert appeared to be over. Yet neither the singers nor the audience seemed ready to let the night end.
On the evening of August 12 at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, the Yale Whiffenpoofs finished their scheduled program before returning to the stage for an encore featuring three Chinese songs: the traditional folk tune "Jasmine Flower," the popular hit "The Brightest Star in the Night Sky" and "Let the World Be Filled with Love."
The singers' carefully rehearsed Chinese was soon joined by voices from the auditorium, turning the encore into a chorus shared across the hall.
The moment brought a longer journey into focus. More than four decades after the Whiffenpoofs first toured China in 1985, the current ensemble spent 15 days traveling to nine destinations across the country in March and April before returning to Beijing in August.
Founded in 1909, the Whiffenpoofs are the oldest collegiate a cappella group in the US. Each year, 14 Yale students are selected for the student-run ensemble, which performs more than 200 concerts across six continents.
Over its 117-year history, the group has counted among its members songwriter and composer Cole Porter, former US senator Prescott Bush and actor Ron Livingston.
Most of the current members are not music majors. They study subjects ranging from history and global affairs to chemistry, biomedical engineering, neuroscience and economics, but set aside a year to place music at the center of their lives.
Across concert halls, university campuses and villages, the young singers encountered people and places that could not be reduced to distant headlines or images on a screen.
Their journey was not simply about mastering unfamiliar lyrics. It was also about what could begin once the singing stopped and conversation began.
The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GT

The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GTShared voices
For Zhang Yixiao, a 22-year-old Beijing native and the group's assistant musical director, one of those melodies carried a particularly personal memory.
Long before he left for Yale University, Zhang sang with the renowned Beijing Philharmonic Choir, founded by conductor Yang Hongnian. He also performed on the same stage during the annual August Chorus Festival.
"The Brightest Star in the Night Sky" was also a song he had grown up with - one that used to play over the loudspeakers while he and his classmates ran laps in middle school. Years later, he taught it to his American teammates and listened as a Beijing audience sang it back to them.
During the China tour, Zhang, who studies global affairs and economics at Yale, also helped his fellow singers cross a less familiar musical boundary. He selected the Chinese songs, explained their meanings and helped the group with pronunciation. The pieces were arranged by members of the ensemble.
He chose songs from different ends of China's musical landscape: "The Brightest Star in the Night Sky" represented a contemporary memory shared by many young Chinese people; "Jasmine Flower" introduced the group to one of the country's most recognizable traditional melodies.
The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GT

The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GT
The work was shared by Eunice Oh, the first woman to serve as musical director in the Whiffenpoofs' history. Together, Oh and Zhang led the group through the process of learning the Chinese repertoire.
Hearing the Beijing audience join in gave that work an immediate payoff. "I really loved being able to sing with the audience," Oh told the Global Times. "It was very heartwarming."
Getting there required some work. "I think it's a little bit difficult, just because it's so different from the sounds we make in English," Oh said. Zhang taught the group not only how to pronounce the words but also what the lyrics meant. The process was nevertheless enjoyable, and "definitely worth the effort we put in," she said.
The response was often immediate. At performances across China, those in the audience who knew the words sang along.
"That was when we could feel the power of music transcending language divides," Zhang said. "No matter where we come from, or whether an ocean lies between us, we share a love of music and a love of life."
Other songs opened different conversations. After the group performed "Midnight Train to Georgia," a few people in the audience approached the singers to ask about a dance sequence in the number. The answer led to discussions of Hollywood and American popular culture. Chinese students, in turn, introduced Peking Opera and traditional instruments including the pipa, suona and guzheng.
The songs gave the two groups something concrete to ask each other about.
Echoes across time
The Whiffenpoofs' China tour this year was built around a piece of the group's own history.
In 1985, at the invitation of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, the Whiffenpoofs made their first trip to China, performing in Beijing, Nanjing and Guangzhou. Parts of the journey were later preserved in the short documentary Perfect Harmony: The Whiffenpoofs in China.
They arrived in a country still in the early years of reform and opening-up, when even Coca-Cola was a novelty for many Chinese people, and so was the sight of a group of young American visitors.
The "Whiffs" climbed the Great Wall, spoke with Chinese university students, stopped to watch elderly residents practice tai chi, and sang in the open air at the Temple of Heaven.
The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform in China during their 1985 tour. Photo: Screenshot from the documentary Perfect Harmony: The Whiffenpoofs in China

The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform in China during their 1985 tour. Photo: Screenshot from the documentary Perfect Harmony: The Whiffenpoofs in ChinaFour decades later, the Temple of Heaven offered the clearest point of return. The singers stood where their predecessors had performed and sang the same song.
"Just as they had sung at the Temple of Heaven, we sang the same song again in the same place," Zhang said.
The reprise linked the two tours, while the rest of the itinerary showed how much more geographically varied the 2026 journey had become.
The new route extended well beyond major cities. In Zhaoxing Dong Village, Southwest China's Guizhou Province, the group performed with local choirs and listened to the Grand song of the Dong ethnic group, a polyphonic tradition performed without a conductor or instrumental accompaniment. The encounter brought together two distinct a cappella traditions.
Passed down orally within Dong communities, the tradition includes imitative songs that reproduce sounds from the natural world, particularly animal calls. It was inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009.
Members of the Yale Whiffenpoofs perform with local singers in Zhaoxing Dong Village, Southwest China's Guizhou Province, on March 23, 2026. Photo: IC

Members of the Yale Whiffenpoofs perform with local singers in Zhaoxing Dong Village, Southwest China's Guizhou Province, on March 23, 2026. Photo: ICMembers also learned to play the Dong pipa, tried batik dyeing and joined residents in pounding glutinous rice, according to the Xinhua News Agency.
Zhang said stops such as Zhaoxing and Zhangjiajie gave his fellow singers a view of "a more diverse and different China."
The contrast between major cities and smaller villages became one of Oh's strongest impressions. "Being able to see the diversity that China has to offer, from these big cities to smaller villages, was incredible," Oh said. "I think it is a place unlike any other place I've been in my life and in my travels," she said.
Beyond the stage
Exchanges with Chinese students ran through both visits. During the March tour and the group's return to Beijing in August, the Whiffenpoofs visited universities, performed with student choirs and talked with peers close to their own age.
"Although we grew up in very different countries, the fact that we can all stand together and sing a song really brought us together," Oh said. "Music is a way to connect people."
Yet the connection did not end with the performance. Conversations with Chinese students gave the visitors access to the ordinary details of lives that rarely appear in international headlines.
"It's a very cool way to understand how people similar to our age have been experiencing their lives, and to share that with one another, and just learn about their culture and traditions and background in a way that is very different from just looking on social media or looking in a history textbook," Oh said.
Chinese students described the exchange in similarly concrete terms. Pan Lutong, a Nankai University student who performed with the Whiffenpoofs, said it was her first opportunity to work closely with a choir from an overseas university.
Outside rehearsals, the students also visited Tianjin's Ancient Culture Street together.
"This kind of exchange between students gave us a valuable friendship," Pan said.
The encounters continued in Beijing. On August 10, shortly after arriving in the city, the Whiffenpoofs rehearsed "The Brightest Star in the Night Sky" with the Beijing Wuzi University Riparian Choir.
"Through music, students from China and the US formed friendships and gained new cultural perspectives and musical experiences," a representative of the Riparian Choir told the Global Times.
The August 12 concert was the final performance of the group's year together. Two weeks later, Zhang said, the members would return to Yale, resume their studies and leave the road to another generation of Whiffenpoofs.
That work may continue after the tour. "This experience has shown me the importance and meaning of cultural exchange and face-to-face interaction," Zhang said. "I hope to continue working in this field in the future."
The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GT

The Yale Whiffenpoofs perform at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on August 12, 2026. Photo: Li Hao/GT
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　一键部署OpenClaw 千年前，宋人于诗书画瓷之间，构建了中国美学的精神高峰。千年后，箭牌瓷砖将这座高峰拆解成一片片温润的砖面，铺进千家万户的烟火日常。

B | 7月25日，箭牌瓷砖在上海举办了2026年秋季新品发布会。从宋境系列的迭代到全场景砖配体系的深化，这场发布会透露出的信号清晰而坚定——箭牌瓷砖正在将宋代美学从一种“设计风格”升维为一种“空间底层逻辑”。而这一逻辑的拷问，远不止于发布会上的聚光灯之下。当一间居所被精心铺陈，一块砖究竟能承载什么？ 雨过天青处，宋韵入砖来 北宋年间，汝窑匠人于釉水中调和玛瑙末，烧出“雨过天青云破处”的温润色泽。千年之后，箭牌瓷砖将其凝练为“云烟”“素瓷”“浅砚”“瀚海”“云涧”“素缦”“浅檀”“雅丹”“深砚”九种低饱和宋韵色调，置于光影之下，清雅如古画，内敛似宋瓷。

C | 箭牌瓷砖自2023年起将宋代美学作为产品主线，历经四年深耕，推出了宋代美学三部曲-绒·石PRO系列、寻系列、宋境系列。此次发布会新品在宋境系列上迭代升级，正式推出第二代宋境系列。这一系列以宋代六大名品“玉、石、锦、画、木、璞”为灵感，并非复刻古物，而是将宋人“不争浓艳、偏爱清简”的心性，经由砖面译作当代居所的语言。以去年备受青睐的「宋境·锦」为例，砖面暗纹如锦缎隐现，手抚过处，有丝缕般的微凸肌理，华美敛于光影之间，不输宋绣的精致笔法。「宋境·锦」产品效果图而今年新推的「宋境·石」与「宋境·璞」，一者自带天然山水纹理，光线下泛着青瓷般的珠光柔晕，铺在客厅便如将一幅浅绛山水横陈于足下；另一者则全然哑光素面，米灰底色不争不抢，像一张未落笔的宣纸，留白给家具、给光线，也留给居住者一日奔波后终于松弛下来的那口气。「宋境·石」产品效果图「宋境·璞」产品效果图千年前的“淡、柔、和、简、雅”，就这样被一砖一瓦译成了日常。

D | 触摸一块砖，触到的不再是冰冷的建材，而是宋画中的山脊、宋瓷上的釉光、宋词里那阵穿过竹帘的晚风。瓷砖不止是遮蔽地面的材料，它也可以是文化的承托，是生活美学的落笔。 一砖一境，各得所爱 宋代美学最动人之处，在于它懂得不贪满，不张扬，不着一字而尽得风流。它讲“留白”，是画中云水相接处那片空茫，也是居所中一面素墙、一方静地的沉默诉说；它讲“格物”，是宋人俯身细察山川纹理、草木姿态，以万物为师，而后落笔成诗；它讲人与物的相敬如宾，是器物不喧宾夺主，人亦不贪求堆砌，二者各安其位，共酿一室清欢。笔者料想箭牌瓷砖是深谙此道的。箭牌瓷砖没有将宋韵止步于一片砖的肌理或色调，而是将这份东方式的空间哲思，由点及面，由微入宏，铺展至整个居住场域的组织逻辑之中，这便是“全场景空间砖配大师”战略的底色与灵韵。以箭牌瓷砖高端丝绒柔光工艺、奶油风爆款——金丝绒系列子母款为例。715/126/800三尺寸同色配套，可实现全屋地面、墙面、卫生间通铺统一。其子母砖相生相成，尺寸各异而气脉相通，色彩相承而层次分明，肌理相映而动静皆宜。客厅以主砖铺就开阔朗净，任日光倾泻、步履从容；厨卫以子砖延续实用与细腻，于烟火升腾处不失整洁温润；整座居所，不再是砖块的机械拼合，而是一幅徐徐展开的长卷，目之所及，皆有呼应；足之所履，皆有回响。金丝绒子母款产品空间设计金丝绒子母款写就的这阕空间小令，也不过是箭牌瓷砖全场景空间叙事中的一隅。若将视野展开，便会发现箭牌真正的用心，在于让偏爱繁华者，得其所华；偏爱简素者，得其所素。每一种选择，都被郑重以待；每一处空间，都被诗意注满。从宋境系列的高远清雅，到金丝绒系列的温软亲厚，从双模轻纹的艺术孤品气质，再到瓷木美学砖的自然拙朴意趣，箭牌瓷砖以一条完整的产品脉络，为每一种生活偏好找到了恰如其分的落笔之处。 “各有偏爱，各得所爱”——箭牌瓷砖这句轻轻落下的品牌主张，不喧哗，不刻意，却如宋人尺牍中的一句短笺，朴素而深情。 大国品牌，器以载道 2026年初，箭牌家居正式入选央视《大国品牌》。这不是一顶凭空而至的冠冕，而是三十余年深耕的积淀与回响。作为质感轻纹砖品类的开创者，箭牌瓷砖成立了“理想空间研究院”，邀请百位私宅设计师驻场共创，将一线设计需求直接嵌入研发流程；也将数万户真实家庭的居住痛点，让“防滑”“易洁”“温感”这些关键词，成为产品迭代的指南针；更参与起草5A新国标，并联合中国陶瓷工业协会发布《轻纹砖》团体标准，将企业经验淬炼为行业共同的起跑线。从“我造什么，你用什么”到“你我共筑，各得其美”，箭牌瓷砖的生态共建，是以标准为骨架，以设计师为经络，而千万个家庭的日常，是生生不息的血液。然而，真正让一个品牌配得上“大国”二字的，不仅是标准的制定权，更是对“器以载道”的坚守。

E | 宋代美学之所以千年不衰，不仅因其画境之雅、瓷色之润，更因其背后那份“格物致知”的匠心精神——于细微处见功夫，于平凡中见不凡。大国品牌，贵在有根脉。箭牌瓷砖的根，扎在三十余年对中国家庭居住方式的深刻洞察里，也扎在千年宋韵的文化厚土之中。其不追逐短暂的潮流喧嚷，而是以“格物”之心，日日打磨、代代精进，在一砖一瓦之间，完成了从“中国制造”到“中国美学”的价值跃迁。器以载道，道不远人。这便是箭牌瓷砖作为大国品牌，写下的最深沉的注脚。