Shen Ping Kwang (1922–2015), founder of Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts’ music department, was a respected Singapore composer and music educator. Born in Zhao’an county in China’s Fujian province, he attended singing and Teochew opera classes in his primary school years. He later enrolled in what is now known as the National Fujian School of Music to major in theory and composition in 1940. He joined the army in 1945, serving as the conductor of Nanjing’s Xiong Shi He Chang Tuan (Male Lions Choir).

After the Second Sino-Japanese War, he left the army and took part in the opera The Great Wall, based on the legend of the Lady Meng Jiang, an opera by Russian Jewish composer Aaron Avshalomov (1894–1965). In 1947, he was invited to work with the Taiwan Provincial Symphony Orchestra (now known as the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra) and was later hired by the Taiwan Provincial Normal School (now the National Taipei University of Education) to start its music department. He began teaching at the newly established National Taiwan University of Arts in 1955, and held his first solo concert in Taipei in 1957.

Hwang Yau-tai (left) and Shen Ping Kwang (right), 2002. From Taiwan Music Institute at Open Museum.
Shen Ping Kwang (centre), 1994. From Lianhe Zaobao, reproduced with permission from SPH Media Limited.

Arrival in Southeast Asia

In 1958, Shen went to teach in British North Borneo. While he was there, he helped organise the North Borneo Chinese Cultural Association (now known as Chinese Cultural Association Sabah), and also formed a choir. In 1961, he held a choral concert where he adapted Borneo folk songs, which were then performed in four languages: English, Chinese, Malay, and Kadazan. He also performed in Sandakan in 1962, represented North Borneo at the South East Asia Cultural Festival held in Singapore in 1963, and won first prize in a songwriting competition organised by Radio Malaysia in 1967.

After that, he spent two years between 1968 and 1970 at the State University of New York furthering his studies in theory, composition, and conducting. He returned to Sabah in 1970 to become the principal of Kian Kok Middle School. In 1972, he was invited to speak at the University of Singapore on the topic of music education in the city state. Two years later, he transferred to Singapore’s National Institute of Education to lecture in its music department. In 1974, Shen represented Singapore at the second Asian Composers League (ACL) in Kyoto, where he presented his string quartet Three Scenes from the Straits. He also organised a society for Singapore’s composers in 1980, and hosted the 8th ACL in Singapore in 1983. He established the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts’ music department in 1984, and was conferred the Artistic Excellence Award by the Composers and Authors Society of Singapore (COMPASS) in 2001.

Pioneering composer

Shen’s compositions were mainly songs. Those he had composed between the 1940s and 1950s were filled with patriotism for China. During his time in Southeast Asia, he started to reflect the local and ethnic flavours of different regions in his songs, and Chinese festivals continued to be a key theme in his work.

The diversity of the material used in his songs reflected his journey through China, Taiwan, and various Southeast Asian countries. Taiwanese ethnomusicologist Hsu Tsang-Houei referred to him as the “the man who planted seeds for the composers’ community in Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia”.1

According to existing records, Shen’s published works span from 1944 to 1990. They include at least two orchestral compositions, three chamber pieces, four instrumental solos, two musicals, 58 solo songs, and 46 choral numbers.2Shen recalled in 2009 that more than 30 concerts featuring his musical works had been held in Singapore and abroad — a rare feat for a Chinese composer.3