Weimar Shanghai - who was McGinty ?

Who was McGinty ? A postcard from Shanghai 100 years ago. Shanghai was a boom town, a thriving metropolis rivalling New York, London and Berlin.  Yet only 50 years previously, it had been a fishing village on  a riverbank.  Shanghai came into existence, after the Second Opium War. It was never a colony, though foreign nationals enjoyed extra-territorial rights.  Rumours had it that there were signs in parks that read "No Chinese and no dogs!".  Yet Shanghai was the first "world city" of the 20th century, with booming industries, a gateway between the vast interior of China and the world.  The city thrived from the influx of cheap immigrant labour and local adaptation to modern industrial methods.  Extremes of wealth and of poverty, of sophistication and feudal tradition, albeit for peasants dispossessed and dislocated from traditional social networks.  Weimar Shanghai !

So who was McGinty ?  His name's generic, bestowed with irony by foreigners, and somewhat deprecating, since Irish people weren't given much respect either, in those days.  There he stands in evening dress, with top hat, tails and cigar.  But is he a worldly, privileged man about town ?  Or was he some poor peasant orphan, dressed up to amuse  night club patrons, whose experience of "real" Chinese people was strictly limited.  The McGinty's of this world have ever existed, as dwarves in royal courts, or freaks in circus shows, mocked and patronized, like performing pets. Yet what characters they must have been, to stand up to prejudice and often cruelty, to make some sort of livelihood despite the odds being stacked against them.  So when I found McGinty, I wanted to honour him, whoever he might have been, however he might have ended up.  Not forgotten by me !

Please also see my piece on Franz Schreker's Die Gezeichneten. Alviano Salvago is a nobleman, rich, talented and intelligent, yet gets screwed by the world around him, because he's different. McGinty would have understood. 

Shanghai Symphony Orchestra - China's oldest and biggest

The BBC Proms always feature orchestras from outside the UK. We've heard the Berliner Philharmoniker, he Wiener Philharmoniker, SWR  Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Concerto Copenhagen and many, many more. This year the focus is on orchestras from outside Europe.  The China Philharmonic Orchestra featured in the Second Night of the Proms. (reviewed here). Classical music audiences in Asia (in particular) are vast, and growing, so by including  less well known orchestras, the Proms connects to audiences in the countries the orchestras come from (Turkey, The Middle East etc)  All part of one huge world-wide family.

The Shanghai Symphony Orchestra is the oldest orchestra in Asia. It was founded 1879. Shanghai was a prosperous, cosmopolitan city, so the orchestra soon became well established.  Details of the 2014-15 season have just been announced. If you're wondering why the photo above looks familiar, it was taken at the Philharmonie in Berlin  The SSO is international.

"What feels like to be the richest orchestra in an emerging second-richest country in the world? Ask Shanghai Symphony Orchestra." writes Rudolph Tang in Klassikom. "With 60 million RMB from the government subsidy and another 30 million from its board which comprises some of the biggest state businesses in Shanghai, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra engrosses over 100 million RMB (or USD 15 million) as its annual budget. The orchestra announced its probably the most ambitious season ever at the SSO’s new hall this afternoon. The 14-15 season of SSO in a comprehensive season integrates both the orchestra and the two halls that seat 1,500 in total."  Read the full article HERE.

The Song of the Fishermen

Song of the Fisherman (漁光曲) is an icon of Chinese cinema. Released in 1934, it was a huge box-office success screened all over China. It was a good movie, but also captured the spirit of the times. Although it's a silent, at its heart lies a song. It sounds like folk song but was in fact written for the film by a classically trained composer who made it simple enough that audiences could sing along. During the years of war and turmoil, people would sing it to themselves, identifying with the plight of the fisherfolk, resolute against all odds.  HERE is a link to the recording by the star of the film, Wang Ren Mei (王人美).

"Cloud float across  the sky, fish are swimming in the water.  The sun dries the fishing nets in the morning. Wind blows against my face. The tides are turning, the waves are rising, fishing boats setting sail in all directions. cast the net, cast the net. It's hard to catch fish when the weather is bad. Fishing is difficult and rents need to be paid. Fishermen are poor from generation to generation. The old fishing net my grandfather gave me, it gives us a living through the winter" (song starts at 36' into the movie.) . Schubert fans will recognize the gentle rocking lines, like the movement of a boat being rowed along the water. The Ave Maria soundtrack was added later.

Beautiful shots of of fishing junks, on  a wide river.... "The East Sea was beautiful: poets praised it, fishermen scraped a living". Cut to a shot of a bucket breaking ice to draw water to heat on a fire. In this hard winter, a woman gives birth to twins. The family are so poor that it's not a time for rejoicing. But notice how lovingly the humble hovel is filmed: details like the grain on boards of wood are shot in clear focus. The father gets killed at sea, the mother is forced to work as a wet nurse for rich people, while her own babies starve. The boy she nurses loves her though, and later sneaks off to play on the beach with the twins, Little Cat (Wang Ren Mei) and Little Monkey (Han Lan Gen 韩兰根), a wonderful character actor with a distinctive "crying face" that lent itself to comedy while heartbreakingly sad, In this film, Little Monkey is retarded, as so many were in days before good health care, Han grimaces and jerks his limbs like he's spastic: perhaps observed from real life. His sister can sing the Song of the Fishermen better than anyone else, so she sings it to comfort him.

When the kids grow up the rich man's son gets sent overseas to learn the maritime business. His family move to Shanghai and invest. Little Cat and Little Monkey can't make a living at sea so they, too drift to Shanghai in search of work. The Director, Cai Chusheng (1906-1968, 蔡楚生), shows a long sequence outside factory gates where the unemployed queue desperately for a chance at a job, as well shot as any European film of the time. (qv Kuhle Wampe). The previous year Cai had directed New Women (with Ruan Lingyu with whom he's supposedly had an affair). Cai came from ShunTak, upriver from Macau, a Cantonese like Ruan, both migrants to Shanghai like millions of others. Cai was an enlightened liberal, so Song of The Fisherman, New Women and The Spring River flows East (1947) depict strong women.

In Shanghai, Little Cat and Little Monkey scavenge on the streets, but there are always urchins poorer and more desperate than they are. By luck, Little Monkey's strange features land him a job with street performers: nice scene showing traditional outdoor theatre. They meet up with the rich man's son who gives them money, because he hears their mother is ill: he still loves her and feels guilty that his good fortune might have given Little Monkey his affliction. However, the police think Little Cat and Little Monkey have stolen the money and they stand trial. They're released and use the money to buy fat pork and treats for their mother, but when the arrive at the village, she's dead. Then the rich family lose everything in a banking swindle. The son gets a job on a small trawler and takes Little Cat and Little Monkey with him.But Little Monkey is worn out, collapses and dies. Little Cat comforts him by singing the Song of the Fisherman. Han Lan Gen might look like an idiot. and play idiots, but he's a very fine actor. Watch his features change as he faces death and hears the familiar melody "Fishermen are poor from generation to generation. The old fishing net my grandfather gave me, it gives us a living through the winter".

Antique Shanghai Pop Music 1930-49

In the 1920's -40's Shanghai was the biggest city in the world, eclipsing New York. Before the 1840's, Shanghai was a small fishing village but its strategic position in the Yangtze delta meant that it was a gateway to the Chinese interior. Everyone in Shanghai was a migrant from somewhere else. Everyone's a newcomer, everything's new. This was a city that invented itself, a symbol of New China. Shanghai was so big, and its hinterland so vast, that it generated its own cultural momentum. HERE is a link to a programme which contrasts Chinese, western and Japanese music from the 1930's. Listen especially to the commentary, which is very well informed. Chinese popular music thrived in its own right, with its own self-generating market. It wasn't grafted on western roots, but sometimes adapted ideas from the west to Chinese expectations. These songs were by no means "covers" in the modern sense, but unique in their own right. Shanghai was sophisticated enough that anyone who really wanted western music could easily get it in nightclubs or on 78's. As long as attitudes to world culture are dominated by west-centric exclusiveness, we won't understand how audiences in China relate to classical music. And since China, Korea and Japan are possibly the future of classical music, we really need to know. Enjoy this download, it's free. More programmes available, just scroll down. Thank you Ling Tai Kor ! If you're interested, there's a lot more on this site about Chinese music, Shanghai, cross-cultural interactions, Chinese film and culture.

Early Chinese cinema - Two Stars in the Milky Way

More Chinese Weimar - Two Stars in the Milky Way (1931).  Art Deco Shanghai in all its glory, and documentary about Chinese film making. Essential background viewing for anyone interested in cinema, China and social mores.

Violet Wong plays Lee Yuenying, daughter of a scholarly gentleman who composes entirely in western style - piano, bust of Beethoven etc. Perfect life of gentility, "western style" adapted to 1920's China.

Outside their villa on the China coast (near Shanghai by the shape of the sails on the junks) a film company is making a movie. The crew hear Yuenying singing (western song though it's silent). Great shots of how they set up on location filming in those days, complete with hordes of onlookers, peasant farmers and coolies in the background. No need for extras, bystanders just turned up and were incorporated into the film. Watch the hand wound cameras, look at the director with white scarf and solar topee. No costumes needed, they just filmed each other.

Being a nice girl, Yuenying doesn't do public shows, so the film crew go to watch her give an "exhibition dance" for charity. Fantastic 1920's theatre. You can see why Shanghai was the greatest art deco city in the world - the angular lines and patterns fit seamlessly with Chinese geometric concepts of design. Yuenying dances a vaguely "Egyptian" dance, arms bent at angles, elegant poses, very "moderne". Definitely influenced by Ballets Russe. the Tutankhamen craze of the 1920's etc. Shanghai absolutely up to date with what was hot in Europe.

Cut to the film studio and its big 1920's mahogany boardroom. Boss says about the future of Chinese cinema, "We of the film industry have a mission to fulfill, to propagate the values of our people  and contributing knowledge to the public through the screen".

Eventually  westernized, educated Yuenying agrees to act in a movie about traditional China, and sings, too. Not Chinese opera though  as the scenario is highly realistic. As the film is silent, we don't know what she sings. Could be anything, as in China, the lines between genres aren't so strict, like in the west. Yuenying and the actor hero, Yang Yeeyan, fall in love. They have a date playing mini-golf where they meet a rival actress who fancies Yang too. Mini-golf with mini pagodas and mini Chinese bridges - kitsch even then. Watch out too for the fancy car they ride in,  with Dad in the pull down jump seat!

Film is success, and studio hires the art deco theatre for dinner party. Orchestra on stage, first violin takes bow - wonderful authentic looking shot. Yuenying's father and studio boss decide to arrange a marriage, but Yang's cousin reminds him he has a "country-bred" wife at home in the provinces. Too scared to tell Yuenying he's already married traditional style, Yang pretends to be cheating on her with other actress. Heartbroken, Yuenying and father leave the "evil" city and return to their villa by the sea. Film ends with shot of Yang as an old man with stick, and Yuenying, now orphaned, singing by her father's empty chair. Two sequences, transposed. Honour wins over love, but love doesn't end. The title refers to a legend about lovers who were torn apart, turned into stars in the Milky Way.


This is a keynote film, because it shows how Chinese cinema was every bit as up to date as in the west. It's also important because it's "about" Chinese cinematography and moral values.The bosses' speeches in the studio come straight from the heart. Cinema in China was part of the process of becoming modern, and was an expression of progressive sociual principles. What wonderful sets! Also authentic - cheaper to film live than build sets. Read more by searching on this site and also The Chinese Mirror, the best English-language resource on Chinese film on the net. Both films on the DVD have English subtitles. The other film, Spray of Plum Blossoms stars the iconic Ruan Lingyu and is based on Shakespeare. It's worth watching too. Ruan deserves whole posts on  her own - search her name on this site. Violet Wong was a relative of Marion Wong, who made the first Chinese American movie, the Curse of Quon Gwon, in 1917. Although second-generation ABC she easily integrated back to China, quite different to Anna May Wong.  Please take some time to explore my site as there is a lot about Chinese film and culture, Chinese stereotypes, western, Chinese and Japanese film. Spercial emphasis on vintage film and the way film fits into society.