Yue Fei brings a legend to life in Tianjin

Aug 30, 2013, was just a regular weekend day in Xiamen in eastern China's Fujian province. But for Huang Anlun, a veteran Chinese composer, it carried more meaning.

That evening, under the baton of Zheng Xiaoying, China's first female conductor, who was 84 then, Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra debuted the Chinese opera Yue Fei at the concert hall of Xiamen University. It was an opera that Huang had started writing when he was 22, and he had waited for 35 years to have it finally played in public.

"When it really happened, I couldn't even believe it," recalls Huang, 66, who is now in Beijing preparing for Yue Fei.