This book introduces four Chinese folk music artists that have dealt with modern musician Su Yang; they are respectively specialized in singing Hua’er (a kind of folk song popular in northwest China), story-telling (popular in Northern Shaanxi), singing Qin opera and playing shadow puppetry. The author especially cares about their talent, music skills and fate in the context of social transition. By following the footsteps of these four artists that live by the side of the Yellow River, this book attempts to find the evidence that the contemporary art intersects with the traditional art, just like the confluence of rivers, and trace the sources of Chinese music art and its vibrant branches.

Dr. Xiao Xuan is a teacher in Chinese Conservatory of Music, dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of anthropology and musicology. Xiao graduated from the Department of Sociology, Tsinghua University, majored in cultural anthropology.