Erhu leads player on to a successful career in music

Rupert Woo Pak-tuen did not choose music as his career. Music chose him.

Woo, the second prize winner of the 2014 International Conducting Competition for Chinese Music, fell in love with the erhu, a two-string Chinese fiddle, during his teens, but he can't pinpoint what first prompted his interest in the instrument.

"I played the piano during my primary school years. So it was a strange thing for me to join the erhu class in my first year at the Tuen Mun Government Secondary School. I don't know why I did it. Maybe because there was a school orchestra there? Maybe the teacher? I can't remember exactly why," he says, scratching his Beethoven-like mop of hair.

From that time on, Woo was besotted - but it wasn't all plain sailing. "My school grades weren't good, so my parents asked me to stop playing music. I promised them, in bitter tears, that I would improve my grades as long as I could continue with my erhu," he says.

In his senior high school years, Woo became concertmaster of the school orchestra. As the band leader, he led rehearsals and had a foretaste of conducting. Victory at a national competition for school orchestras in Beijing affirmed his determination on a music career.

But his parents intervened again. "They said a music career would not feed me, and a university degree would be better. With the first prize from Beijing, the school principal recommended me to the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and I was accepted."