Hwang Yau-tai was born in 1912 in the western part of Guangdong province. His love of music, art, poetry, and literature was fostered from an early age. At seven, he attended the Chi-Ying Elementary School founded by his father, Hwang Tsang-Zhang. He was educated in Canton and graduated in 1934 with a B.A. in Education from Sun Yat-sen University in Canton. At the same time, he obtained the Higher Local Certificate for Violin from Trinity College of Music, London. Professor Alice Lee and Professor Tonoff were his tutors in piano and violin, respectively. For his lessons in violin, he traveled frequently from Canton to Hong Kong by train. After the Sino-Japanese War broke out, he moved to the northern part of Guangdong. During the hostilities with Japan, it was difficult to obtain a piano in inland China, which was why he used a violin instead. He wrote many lyrical pieces and folk songs with variations, which were played with great success everywhere. He taught people how to appreciate the solo violin sonatas by Bach and violin caprices by Paganini, as well as lyrical pieces by Wieniawski and others. When he realised that audiences preferred Chinese music, he began to devote his energies to Chinese style music.
Chinese music composer Hwang Yau-tai was a concert violinist before studying composition in Rome, Italy. Photo taken in Hong Kong, 1951.
From 1939 to 1945, he taught music at the Teacher's College of Sun Yat-sen University and the Provincial Institute of Art. He composed music for the army band and songs for various choral groups, conducting the performances himself. After the Armistice, Professor Hwang moved to Hong Kong in 1949. He obtained the diploma for violin from the Royal Schools of Music (LRSM) in 1955 and taught music while improving his composition technique. The songs he composed at this time include "Azaleas in Bloom," "Far from Home," and "Canton My Hometown," which were among the most popular. He discovered that the ancient melodies and folk songs were not limited to the major-minor system, but were actually in different modes. He felt that to compose good music in the Chinese style, modal harmony had to be used together with classical and modern harmony. After 1950, he followed that principle whole-heartedly, composing "Ali-Shan Variations," "Oriental Nocturne," "Lantern Dance" for violin and piano, "Black Mist," and "Ask the Nightingales and Orioles" for solo voice and chorus.
Hwang Yau-tai in the late '50s at Villa Borghese in Italy. Photographer unknownThe "Three Friends of Winter": Composer Hwang Yau-tai (left) with composer Lin Sheng-shih and lyricist Harold H. T. Wei (Han-zhang Wei) in Hong Kong, mid 1960s
In 1957, with the help of friends from Tai Tung High School in Hong Kong, he furthered his studies in Europe. In London, Professor Harry Stubbs taught him practical composing techniques, and in Switzerland, Padre Kellin illustrated the use of modes in religious music. In Rome, two famous professors taught him musical composition. Maestro Franco Margola at the Pontifical Academy in Rome trained him further in classical harmony, modern harmony, and orchestration, while Maestro Edgardo Carducci taught him strict modal counterpoint and modern composition. After six years of hard work, he succeeded in obtaining a Master of Composition degree from the Mondiale Academy of Art. Hwang Yau-tai has earned his living by teaching, composing songs, copying manuscripts, and printing music. He has been invited to compose songs frequently for schools, institutes, and various associations. In Hong Kong, Taiwan, and cities in southeast Asia and the United States, his compositions are performed regularly, and his tutor, Maestro Margola, often conducts Hwang's orchestral works in Bologna and Parma, Italy.
Hwang loved Chinese culture and felt it was his duty to promote the cultural heritage. In 1962, he was awarded the Culture and Arts Award by the Ministry of Education and in 1967, the Chung Shan Culture and Arts Award for his Cantata, "Great China," which has 11 movements. In 1968, he went to Taiwan at the invitation of the Ministry of Education to give lectures explaining his theory of Chinese-style composition of music. President Chiang Kai-shek gave Hwang an audience on September 16, 1968. Hwang has donated all the cash prizes he has won to Taiwan Music Educational work, saying, "This unexpected income should be used for musical education."
Throughout most of Hwang's life, China was enveloped in constant warfare. The Qing Dynasty (1644–1911), already weakened by the Opium Wars (1842, 1860), the Taiping Rebellion (1850–1864), and the Boxer Rebellion (1900) that by the time Hwang was born in 1912, its collapse opened way for the birth of the Republic of China, led by Sun Yat-sen. Hwang was a young boy at the beginning of the Warlords Era (1916–28) that kept much of the country divided into fiefdoms. 1919's May 4 movement marked the beginning of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that engaged the fledgling Kuomintang (KMT) for over 20 years of struggle (1927–49). In between the fighting, the 2nd Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) and the Chinese Civil War (1946–1949) took place during Hwang's adult life. It was in 1941 when Hwang wrote the popular song, "Azaleas in Bloom," describing a maiden who wears an azalea, waiting for her sweetheart to return home from war. Hwang left his young family to look for work in Hong Kong in 1949 when Mao Zedong's CCP proved victorious over the KMT, led by Chiang Kai-shek. It was in Hong Kong where Hwang lived for 32 years, leaving only for 6 years in 1957 to study music in Europe. His wife and their three daughters, Mimi, Jane and Nancy, emigrated to the United States in 1956. In Hong Kong, Hwang could still teach and write music and was able to avoid the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) when many intellectuals and scholars were persecuted. Plagued by eye problems brought on by weather conditions and anxious about Hong Kong's future in 1987, Hwang settled in Kaohsiung, Taiwan where he lived for the next 23 years. The composer, who wrote of the longing for his homeland ("Canton, my Hometown," "Far from Home," "Song of the Cotton Tree") found refuge inside himself and in his music. He was still writing, attending concerts and composing music in his own unique Chinese-style of harmony including musical pieces on Buddhist sutras and texts Huihai gei (The Sea of Wisdom), Xiaowu (Morning Mist) and Moni Zhu (The Pearl) and on the philosopher Confucius before being hospitalized due to a fall in 2009.
Hwang died of multiple organ failure on July 4, 2010, at Kaohsiung Veterans General Hospital after breaking both hips in a fall in 2009. At the July 13 funeral service held at Yuen Chao Temple in Kaohsiung County, ROC President Ma Ying-jeou sang "Azaleas in Bloom" along with other attendees.
Family
Hwang Yau-tai and family in Hong Kong, 1955.
Hwang had three daughters, Mimi, Jane, and Nancy, to whom he dedicated his 1988 songbook, Lyrical Pieces for Piano Solo (with Vocal Score).
In 1960, Hwang composed two songs for his 11-year-old daughter Nancy, who showed him some of her poems. "Death of a Deer" and "Luckless Day" for mezzo-soprano solo and pianoforte accompaniment were published later in 1967 by Lucky Music Copy Service in Kowloon, Hong Kong.
Hwang married Liu Feng-hsien in 1943, but after living apart for over 20 years, the couple formally divorced in 1965.
Awards
Hwang Yau-tai receives a banner ("Revitalizing Music & Dance") commemorating his visit to Taiwan to give music lectures for teachers and students late '60s.
1952 Composition Award of Patriotic Song, Chinese Writers' & Artists' Association
1962 The Culture & Arts Award, Ministry of Education
2000 The Senior Cultural Intellectual Award, Council for Cultural Affairs, the Executive Yuan
2000 The 19th Lifetime Achievement Award, Kaohsiung City Government
2001 National Files Award, the Bureau of National Confidential
Selected works
Chiang Kai-shek and Chinese music composer Hwang Yau-tai in Taipei, Taiwan September 1968. Hwang would later compose the memorial song for Chiang Kai-shek's funeral in 1975.March 2010 program for Hwang Yau-tai memorial concert in Houston, Texas.
