Professor Yang Liqing is the President of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, as well as being on the faculty of the graduate programme and supervisor for doctoral studies. After graduating from Shenyang Conservatory of Music where he majored in composition, Professor Yang did his post-graduate studies at the Composition and Conducting Department of the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and the Hannover Hochschule für Musik und Theater, Germany, where he was awarded a master degree in piano and a doctoral degree in composition. Yang Liqing is a Council Member of the Chinese Musicians Association, Vice Chairman of the Shanghai Musicians Association, and Director of Shanghai Modern Music Academic Society.

Professor Yang is a renowned composer and scholar of contemporary compositional technique and orchestration. He has been the recipient of numerous research fellowships, including the Deutcher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (German Academic Exchange Service) Fellowship from Germany, the Asian Cultural Council and Committee on Scholarly Communication with China Fellowships from the United States. His major compositions include the songcycle Four Pieces of Tang Poetry, the symphonic poem Wujiang Hatred, Festival Overture for orchestra, and Dusk of Lonely Desert for erhu and orchestra. His works have been frequently performed in China and abroad, and have been featured at major international music festivals, such as the Lyon Music Festival in France and the Yokohoma Asian Music Festival in Japan.

His compositions have been awarded the Second and First Prizes in the 1985 and 2004 Chinese National Competition for Orchestral Composition. His major publications include Studies of Messiaen’s Composing Techniques and A Course in Orchestration.