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China's first lady Peng Liyuan, a former army soprano, offers tips to Juilliard music student in NYC as Tianjin campus announced

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Peng Liyuan offers advice to student Liv Redpath, who had just performed a Chinese song at the Juilliard School of music in New York. Photo: CNS

China’s first lady Peng Liyuan visited one of the world’s leading music and performing arts school – The Juilliard School – and also witnessed their formal announcement to expand into China as she makes her last stop of her US visit.

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Peng, a renowned former army soprano herself, toured the school in the Lincoln Centre for the Performing Arts and watched a performance put on by students in New York on Monday, state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

A music master’s student performed the Chinese folk song Xiao He Tang Shui (The Rippling Brook), with Peng giving personal tips and demonstrating techniques at first hand to the applause of the audience, according to a China News Service report.

“The most moving thing was that she was so sincere and approachable. I’m very grateful for her patient guidance,” said Liv Redpath, the performing Juilliard student.

Redpath said she had asked a fellow Chinese student for help to practise her Chinese pronunciation and that she had listened repeatedly to Peng’s own recording of the song for weeks before the visit.

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