The first violin edition of the Global Music Education League competition took place in Beijing following a four-year delay due to the pandemic. Emma Baker travelled to China to hear the finals

POSTCARD from...

W inter in Beijing is bone-cold; the locals go about in long padded coats and teddy-bear hats, or zip around the busy streets on scooters and bicycles, their hands tucked into built-in mittens attached to their handlebars. Heavy plastic fringes hang down from doorways to shelter the interior from the bite of the wind. But the low winter sun sparkles through the ice-blue air and the colours on the buildings seem to glow. This huge city was once infamously choked by pollution, but since the pandemic, it has been working hard to clean up its act and feels like a place reborn.

Beijing’s National Center for the Performing Arts

One of the many other things that has re-emerged, post-pandemic, is the annual Global Music Education League (GMEL) competition. The very first edition, for piano, was held in May 2019, just before the world was stopped in its tracks by Covid. After a four-year hiatus, the inaugural violin edition took place from 3 to 13 November 2023.