Music warms hearts amid COVID-19 - Chinese, Egyptian musicians stage virtual performance of Triumphal March

INSPIRING MUSIC

"I played trumpet in my room, and the Egyptian musician played trumpet far away at his home. At different times and in different locations, we shared the joy of playing together with music as the carrier," Yuan Ye, principal trumpet of the Liaoning Symphony Orchestra and an initiator of the online performance, told Xinhua.

"Friendship started when musicians from Liaoning performed in Egypt last year," said Zhu Xinyu, vice president of the Liaoning Opera House, adding that as musicians from both countries were quarantined at home, "here comes the idea of (an) online performance."

The Triumphal March from the second act of "Aida" by Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi tells the story of an Egyptian pharaoh, and "is well known among the Chinese," said Shi Yuewen, cultural counselor of the Chinese Embassy in Egypt, who selected the piece for the performance.

In the opera, musicians playing long trumpets lead the heroic triumphant soldiers into the city, "which is very consistent with the desire of people today to overcome the epidemic," said Shi, also director of the Chinese Cultural Center in Cairo, who initiated and coordinated the performance.

Magdy Saber, the head of the Cairo Opera House, said that the famous piece is deeply inspiring for the two peoples at this very moment, "blowing the horn of unity and cooperation to fight the virus."