生活写照：台下的吴小妹
Life & Moments: Lucy Wu Beyond the Stage
两位音乐家，一把京胡
Two musicians, one Jinghu
吴小妹遇见丈夫的方式，和她生命中大多数重要缘分一样——都是因为京胡。
He Bing 很小就来到美国，是早年赴美华人移民中的一员。他没有进过科班，却自幼在家中随家庭老师学习京胡，对中国传统艺术的那份情感，与其说是训练，不如说是热爱。他第一次见到吴小妹，是在台下当观众。他后来坦言，在他心里，京胡一直像是「男人的乐器」——所以当他看到一位端庄优雅的女性走上舞台，把京胡拉得那样有力，多年来的某种固有印象，就在那一刻悄然被打破。
他提出想拜她为师。起初，她并没有答应。真正的转折发生在一次非正式的京剧聚会上——两人被安排合作一出出了名难唱难拉的对戏，正是张派名剧《状元媒》的选段。那次配合十分默契，正是亲耳听过他的演奏之后，她才点头收下这个学生。她把京剧不同行当——老生、青衣、花脸——背后的传统京胡技法一一传授给他；而在那无数个一同切磋的时光里，老师成了妻子，学生成了丈夫。
他们最惬意的仪式，是一件很小的事。在温哥华与西雅图之间的长途车程上，不开车的那一个便会拿起京胡拉上一段，另一个随之应和。
也正是这份音乐，在一切都还陌生的时候稳住了她。上世纪九十年代初到温哥华时，语言与环境都还陌生，她心里悄悄害怕，怕自己、也怕自己的艺术，会在全新的生活里迷失。让她重新站稳脚跟的，是她发现这座城市里来自内地、香港与台湾的华人社区，依然如此深爱京剧，也如此欣然地接纳一个能让这门艺术延续下去的人。
Lucy Wu found her husband the same way she has found most of the things that matter in her life — through the Jinghu.
He Bing came to the United States young, part of an early wave of Chinese immigrants. He never trained at a conservatory, but he had grown up with the Jinghu at home, taught by a family teacher and tied to Chinese traditional art by something closer to love than discipline. He first saw Lucy from the audience. The Jinghu, he later admitted, had always struck him as “a man’s instrument” — so watching a poised, graceful woman take the stage and play it with that much force quietly undid an assumption he’d carried for years.
He asked to study with her. She said no, at least at first. The turning point came at an informal Beijing opera gathering, where the two were paired for a notoriously difficult duet — an excerpt from *The Top Scholar’s Matchmaker* (状元媒), in the Zhang school style. It went beautifully, and only after hearing him play did she agree to take him on. She taught him the traditional Jinghu techniques behind Peking opera’s different role types — laosheng, qingyi, hualian — and somewhere in all those hours, the teacher became a wife and the student became a husband.
Their happiest ritual is a small one. On the long drives between Vancouver and Seattle, whoever isn’t at the wheel reaches for a Jinghu and begins to play, and the other joins in.
That same music steadied her when everything else felt foreign. When Lucy first arrived in Vancouver in the 1990s, the language and the landscape were unfamiliar, and she was quietly afraid of losing herself — and her art — in a new life. What held her together was discovering how deeply the city’s Chinese communities, from the mainland, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, still loved Beijing opera, and how readily they welcomed someone who could help keep it alive.
比肩同台 Performing Side by Side
如今，两人几乎总是一同出现在舞台上。He Bing 把大量时间投入到支持吴小妹在美国的艺术事业中，夫妻二人在音乐会、慈善活动与商业演出中并肩演出。推动他们前行的那份信念——中国文化只有真正融入美国主流艺术生活，才能产生实实在在的影响——是两人一同得出的共识；而她也总是很快提起，丈夫的支持对她意味着多少。
Today, the two are rarely far from a stage together. He Bing devotes much of his own time to supporting Lucy's work in America, and they perform side by side at concerts, charity events, and commercial shows. The conviction that drives them — that Chinese culture has to become part of mainstream American artistic life to truly matter — is one they arrived at together, and she is quick to say how much his support has carried her.
展望未来 Looking Ahead
对吴小妹而言，把中国文化带向更广阔的世界，从来不只是一份职业上的责任。她更愿意把它形容为一种放不下的召唤——一种藏在心里、半是信念、半是本能的牵挂。而她也从不认为这件事已经做完。用她自己的话说，眼前的舞台在不断变宽，她对艺术还能成为什么样子的想象，也在随之不断生长。
For Lucy Wu, carrying Chinese culture into the wider world has never felt like a professional obligation. She describes it instead as a calling she couldn't set down if she tried — an attachment she holds inside her, part belief and part instinct. And she doesn't see it as finished work. The way she tells it, the stage in front of her keeps widening, and her sense of what her art can become keeps growing right alongside it.
常见问题
FAQ's
问：吴小妹的丈夫也是音乐家吗？ Is Lucy Wu's husband also a musician?
答：是的。吴小妹的丈夫 He Bing 同样是京胡演奏家。两人因京胡结缘，她后来成为他的老师，师生情谊最终步入婚姻——如今他们常在音乐会与慈善活动中同台演出。
Yes. Lucy Wu’s husband, He Bing, is also a Jinghu musician. The two met through the Jinghu, she became his teacher, and their relationship grew into marriage — today they frequently perform together at concerts and charity events.
问：吴小妹与 He Bing 是怎么认识的？ How did Lucy Wu and He Bing meet?
答：他们因京胡结缘。He Bing 看了吴小妹的演出后，提出想拜她为师；在一次京剧聚会上两人合作了一出高难度的对戏之后，她答应收他为徒，而这段师生关系日后发展成了婚姻。
They met through the Jinghu. He Bing saw Lucy Wu perform and asked to study under her; after the two played a difficult duet together at a Beijing opera gathering, she agreed to take him on as a student, and their teacher-and-student relationship later became a marriage.
问：吴小妹移居海外后是如何适应新生活的？ How did Lucy Wu adjust to life after moving abroad?
答：上世纪九十年代移居温哥华后，吴小妹一度面对语言障碍与陌生环境，也曾担心与自己的艺术渐行渐远。是与当地依然热爱京剧的华人社区的相遇，让她重新站稳脚跟，也坚定了她在海外弘扬中国传统艺术的决心。
After moving to Vancouver in the 1990s, Lucy Wu faced a language barrier and unfamiliar surroundings and feared losing her connection to her art. Connecting with local Chinese communities who still loved Beijing opera helped her find her footing and renewed her resolve to promote traditional Chinese art abroad.