"Secrect Garden" tour China

After a silence of three years, the Norwegian band "Secret Garden" is back. They are on a five-city tour of China.

The band started the concert with "Wind dancer", a tune based on the Dorian scale.For Friday's concert in Beijing's Great Hall of the People, the stage had been turned into a forest to embrace the melodious music of the band.

Violinist Fionnuala Sherry was warmly applauded after saying "hello" in Chinese.

Fionnuala Sherry, violinist of Secret Garden, said, "Nihao! Thank you very much. It's a real pleasure for us to be back once more in China and to perform here in the people's congress hall for the very first time. What a privileged for us. Absolutely, we're very delighted to be able to get this performance here for you tonight, in this beautiful hall."

Secret Garden first performed in China in 1997, and this is their sixth visit. On Friday night, the audience was treated to classic tunes as well as pieces from Secret Garden's latest album. In the nearly two and half hour concert, the band performed 24 pieces, as well as two encores.

Rolf Lovland, composer and keyboards, Secret Garden, said, "And the amazing thing is that even though the language is different and the culture is difficult to understand for us. It's amazing that music is a way of talking and communicating. There is no place where you better can see the ideas of sharing emotions in music. "

Fionnuala Sherry said, "China is always an interesting place to be, you know. Because the wide and varied culture. In this promoting trip we also had an opportunity to be integrated a little bit more with the people. We met the most amazing Erhu player in Shanghai. After hearing the performance, a special performance for us, we really like someday to work with her. We also met the composer of Butterfly concerto which is a piece I always my love. Rolf and I got quiet a few different recording of it. He liked us very much. The same philosophy in the sense that melody has to be the most important part of music. You need the melody to tell the story."

Their experiences in China inspired Secret Garden's piece "Lotus".

The band made their name in 1995 with the piece, Nocturne, and they have sold more than three million albums all over the world.

But Secret Garden was forced to take a break when Sherry became ill in 2005. But now, after a silence of three years, Secret Garden is back. And they chose China as the first stop of their comeback.