From the New York Times (link):
In 1990, at 25, Wu Man was ushered onto a plane in Beijing as China’s leading player of the pipa, or Chinese lute. Sixteen hours later, she arrived in New Haven, an unknown adrift in the United States with scant English.
Now Ms. Wu has risen to prominence again, as one of the foremost Asian musicians in North America, one of the handful who can live off their art. Far from tethering herself to Chinese traditional music, she has plucked her way through classical, experimental and world music, even jazz, in the process introducing the pipa’s twang to any number of concertgoers. She has also performed on 29 albums, often with eminent musicians, like the New York Philharmonic and Yo-Yo Ma.
