Often Left Column The Vocal Art Research

Liuzhu Chang is a famous tenor and vocal music educator with outstanding achievement in China. In the 1950s and 1960s, there were a lot of debates about whether the Chinese traditional folk song singing methods should adopt methods of Bel canto, or whether the traditional Chinese folk song singing was superior to Bel canto or vice versa. The debates raised high level of awareness and attention to the folk song singing, which presented an excellent opportunity for the development of Chinese folk song singing education. Mr. Chang was among the best-known tenors at that time. He dedicated his life to the performing arts of singing and has taught the next generation of tenors. Many of his students have become the world-renowned tenors. Mr. Chang lived in Tibet for 20 years, which was deemed to be the most important time in his career. He collected and documented many Tibetan folk songs from the native Tibetan people. He has made remarkable contributions to the development of Chinese vocal art by performing songs, educating students, collecting and researching lyrics from Tibetan and Han peoples.Currently, in home and abroad, the researches on Mr. Chang have been limited to his brief biography and vocal music achievement. Almost no studies on Mr. Chang has been focused on his vocal music education, performing and songwriting.The thesis systematically studied practice of Mr. Chang's vocal performing art and vocal music education. It elevated the practice evidence to music education theories by analyzing the thinking structure behind the practices and summarizing the characteristics of performance. Many of Mr. Chang's perspectives have provided guidance to the current Chinese vocal arts education. The purpose of the study is to summarize Mr. Chang's experience in vocal performance and music vocal education in the past five decades and inspire new generations of music educators including the author herself to learn from Mr. Chang's experience and hence improve their work. This study also lays a foundation for future in-depth study on Mr. Chang's works.