German composer Johannes Brahms' Symphony No 1 in C Minor, Op 68, is a magnificent work of classical music. Considered one of the masterpieces of symphonic repertoire, it continues to captivate music lovers worldwide since its premiere in 1876.

For Qian Junping, the memory of his first encounter with this masterpiece remains vivid. When he was a 16-year-old student, he returned to Shanghai from a music festival abroad. Upon landing, he went straight to a concert, which had this piece by Brahms on the program. Suffering from jet lag, he fell asleep during the first movement. He didn't wake up until the fourth movement, which Qian recalls as "brilliant".

"Compared to the first three movements, which portray the composer's complex web of conflicting ideas, the fourth movement is like a beam of light in a cloudy sky. With rhythms becoming increasingly faster, the bustling energy drives the music toward its overwhelming climax," says Qian, who later listened to the piece over and over.

On May 17 and 18, Qian conducted the China NCPA Orchestra, the resident symphony orchestra of the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, performing Brahms' Symphony No 1 in C Minor, Op 68.

Qian's performances of Brahms' work closed the project of the NCPA, which has four conductors — Daniele Gatti from Italy, Chung Myung-whun from South Korea, and Lyu Jia, chief conductor and music director of the China NCPA Orchestra — playing Brahms' four symphonies with the China NCPA Orchestra.

"For conductors, diving into a composer's score entails analyzing every note, rhythm and dynamic marking to comprehend the intended emotional and musical journey," Qian explains. "It's a task that endlessly fascinates me."

He draws parallels between conductors and directors, likening their relationship to that of film directors and scriptwriters.

"Once a composer completes a piece, their role ends. It's up to the conductor to breathe life into the score onstage," he says. "Conductors decode and interpret the composer's musical language, delivering its essence to audiences."

During the two concerts with the China NCPA Orchestra, he also played Hungarian composer Bela Bartok's Two Portraits, and music piece Phaenomena with the sheng — a traditional mouth-blown free-reed instrument — by Austrian composer Bernd Richard Deutsch. The internationally renowned sheng virtuoso Wu Wei joined the concerts.

"Maestro Qian is talented, technically proficient and handles modern music with ease. His music is beautiful, grand, full of tension and passion," says Wu on Qian's performance. They worked together in Berlin, Germany, on the sheng concerto Yi Jing, a 2015 adaptation of the sheng concerto titled Changes (2003) by German composer Enjott Schneider.

"The interaction between the soloist, conductor and orchestra is like the awe-inspiring chase of thousands of troops on the grassland, occasionally interspersed with the agile calls of birds in the forest," Wu says.

Qian, from Anhui province and now based in Berlin, has a hectic schedule by working with symphony orchestras from home and abroad.

Before the two concerts with the China NCPA Orchestra, he conducted Schneider's opera Marco Polo at the Guangzhou Opera House in Guangdong province, an opera in which he worked closely with composer and director Kasper Holten from Denmark for its premiere in 2018.

In the 2023-24 season, he will debut with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the China National Symphony Orchestra.

Qian's music journey began in childhood when his parents had him study violin at 5 years old, believing it would improve their son's concentration. Later, he studied viola at the music middle school affiliated with the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.

However, Qian always dreamed about becoming a conductor. In 1999, the 9-year-old Qian watched the New Year Concert performed by the Wiener Philharmoniker under the baton of conductor Lorin Maazel on TV. He was intrigued by the performance of the French-born American, who also played the violin during the concert.

"The experience of listening to a symphony orchestra cannot be obtained through listening to any singular instrument. Only the conductor can lead, inspire and request the symphony orchestra to ultimately make the sounds it makes. The conductor communicates with his or her hands and eyes, evoking, molding and shaping the sound of the orchestra," Qian says.

In 2008, Qian was admitted to the Curtis Institute of Music to study viola. His idea of becoming a conductor was supported by Roberto Diaz, Qian's viola teacher, who also leads the Curtis Institute of Music.

"He allowed me to attend conducting courses and encouraged me to make good career decisions," Qian says.

After graduating from the Curtis Institute of Music, Qian studied conducting with maestros including Mark Gibson at the University of Cincinnati and Michael Ken Jinbo of the Pierre Monteux School and Music Festival in Maine.

Qian was also a private student of legendary German-American conductor Otto Werner Mueller. In 2014, after joining the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra as a violist, he was mentored by British conductor Daniel Harding, the music and artistic director of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra.

In 2016, Qian entered the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin in Germany to study conducting, where he graduated in 2019.

"Those great conductors taught me to grow and develop my own style. For example, Mueller taught me how to prepare myself — from reading the music score to turning it into real music. Before rehearsals with the symphony orchestras, I have a clear idea about the music score by analyzing it and being aware of how to deal with it," Qian says. "Harding is a genius. He is also a pilot. Though I was a violist in the orchestra, I was inspired by him. He taught me to know what I want to express through music and how to communicate with the orchestra members.

"They taught me things beyond the music itself," he adds.

In 2015, Qian left his position at the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and has been pursuing a full-time job as a conductor. He has won several international conducting competitions, including first prize at the 2017 Bucharest International Conducting Competition and third prize at the Princess Astrid Conducting Competition in Norway in 2022.

In the 2022-23 performing season, he made his debut with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London. With the Minnesota Orchestra, he created the Lunar New Year project from scratch and has been invited to be in charge of this project for three consecutive years.

Early this year, he conducted the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, featuring Grammy-nominated Chinese-American composer Zhou Tian's First Sight (Chinese premiere) and Brahms' Violin Concerto in D Major, Op 77, and Serenade No 2 in A Major, Op 16. During the encore session, he surprised audiences by playing viola along with Chinese-American violinist Nancy Zhou on the classic Chinese violin concerto, Butterfly Lovers, composed by He Zhanhao and Chen Gang.

"Live performances hold a special allure. As a conductor, I'm continually exploring new horizons by collaborating with orchestras both at home and abroad," Qian says.