Tonight, musicians of the Los Angeles Philharmonic mark the most important holiday for most Asian cultures: Lunar New Year. This February 17, people across the globe will celebrate the start of the Year of the Fire Horse, according to the Chinese zodiac. For many, the festivities will run for 15 days to great a fresh new year and ensure prosperous months ahead.

Our program begins with Haihuai Huang’s Horse Racing, which nods to the Fire Horse—whose coming promises passion, intensity, and transformation for 2026. Huang (1935–67) captures the furious energy and drive of the competing steeds in his phrasing. Originally written in 1959 for erhu, a Chinese two-stringed instrument, the work is presented tonight in an arrangement for cello and piano. With its concise length, galloping tempo, and whinnying melisma at the close, the piece captures the grace and power of two exquisite equines and remains a popular staple of the Chinese musical repertoire.

Born in China and now based in the US, where she is a doctoral student at Princeton University, Dai Wei (b. 1989) writes music that combines elements of Eastern and Western traditions. Last season she was the Sound Investment Composer for Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and she has been commissioned by eminent ensembles including the American Composers Orchestra, Kronos Quartet with pipa player Wu Man, and many others. Her Three Pieces for String Quartet (2016) comprise a trio of miniatures: “Playful,” “Hushed,” and “Agitated.”

Yi-Wen Jiang (b. 1963) began the project that would culminate in ChinaSong during his 26-year tenure as a violinist with the Shanghai Quartet. “To expand the repertoire of the Shanghai Quartet, the idea of arranging Chinese tunes into string quartet pieces was born. The finished works have proven to be showpieces and well-received encores at our concerts,” he wrote in the introduction to an anthology of the pieces, published in 2018. A collection of 24 miniatures was recorded by the Shanghai Quartet in 2002. Jiang compares his arrangements of favorite Chinese melodies—ones that he played “during the dark days of the Chinese Cultural Revolution”—to the folk-inflected music of Bartók, Dvořák, Brahms, and many other Western composers. Jiang’s purpose was twofold: to introduce Chinese music to American audiences and to help popularize chamber music in China.

The evening closes with the sole European work on the program, Mozart’s String Quartet No. 21 in D, K. 575. This cheerful crowd pleaser was written at one of Mozart’s more desperate moments, when in dire financial straits and poor health he sold three of his “Prussian” quartets to a publisher. The composer (1756–91) had intended the works for Friedrich Wilhelm II, King of Prussia (hence their nickname) before peddling them “simply in order to have cash in hand merely to meet my present difficulties,” he admitted to a friend.

The lighthearted Allegretto provides an enchanting opening, followed by an elegantly restrained Andante. The cello—the chosen instrument of Friedrich Wilhelm II—comes to the fore in the third-movement minuet with a lovely countermelody, and it continues its lead into the finale by introducing the main theme, which is expanded, developed, inverted, and recapitulated with the effortless grace that is Mozart’s trademark.

—Amanda Angel