Gao Hongwei
Lineage & School of Heritage
He inherited the performing art of the Gao school of Taiping drum and won the recognition of his father and of the local community, and in time he took the drumsticks from the hands of his father, shouldering the heavy task of transmitting the Taiping drum tradition.
Mastery, Signature Works & Repertoire
He was born in 1969 in Beijing and is of Han ethnicity. His father, Gao Dianqi, was a celebrated performer of the Taiping drum of the western Beijing hills. Gao Hongwei began learning to play the Taiping drum from his father at the age of twelve, and in the early 1980s he joined the Taiping drum troupe organised by his father. Besides performing for villagers in the lanes and alleys, he appeared many times at the various folk flower fairs of Beijing. The Taiping drum as Gao Hongwei performs it is free, buoyant and uninhibited, and his "great fanning drum" movement in particular draws the praise of spectators, retaining the traditional charm that Yang Bu of the Ming dynasty described in his Chang'an Yingnian Guqu (Drum Songs Welcoming the New Year in Chang'an), where he wrote of drummers who shrug their shoulders and shift their heels, unable to contain themselves. At present Gao Hongwei serves as artistic director of the Mentougou "Western Beijing Taiping Drum Heritage School", comprising Xinqiao Road Middle School and Dayu No. 2 Primary School, and he has contributed to the transmission and development of the western Beijing Taiping drum. His representative works include Taiping Yao (Ballad of the Taiping Drum) and Guwu Taiping (Drumming for Peace).
Honors & Recognition
He is a national representative bearer of the Taiping drum of western Beijing, a second-batch national intangible cultural heritage project.
References & Archival Sources
Representative Items of This Bearer
Profile
This static English edition is rendered at the edge for search engines, AI crawlers and readers without JavaScript. Compiled from official national representative bearer archival records, organized by topic and translated into English. 阅读中文版。