As part of the ongoing May Festival at the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing, cellist Chu Yibing treated the audience to a concert together with his cello ensemble. CGTN's Shen Li sat down with the artist to talk about how chamber music makes better musicians, and whether there's a place for Artificial Intelligence in the musical world.

From Chopin's melancholic piece written for piano and cello, to Chinese folk music Eclogue, Chu and his ensemble explored the versatile ability of the cello.

Born in Beijing, Chu started learning the cello at age 8 and went to Europe to pursue his music studies in 1983. Six years later, he became the principal cellist of Switzerland's Basel Symphony Orchestra.

After nearly two decades of living and working in the West, he returned to China in 2004 as the head cello teacher for the Central Conservatory of Music.

From decades of performing in European cello groups, Chu understands that playing chamber music makes true musicians who can discuss interpretations, match styles, study intimate repertoire composers wrote for friends and family, and most importantly, learn to listen.

Shen: In one of your previous interview you said some of the young musicians in China, their ability to collaborate with each other is as poor as the Chinese football players.

Chu: They are a bunch of good people, fantastic people, individually, but they are soldiers without general. Because in chamber music, you can't just follow. In the orchestra, you have 12 or 14 cellists, so you just have to play with the others, it's OK. But in chamber music, you have your own part, and your neighbor the violist, the violinist will have his or her own part. So everyone has their own part, but together we'll be (playing) in harmonic world.

Shen: Let's talk about chamber music, the genre has often been seen as classical music's poor relation. But thanks to musicians like you, the genre has seen a revival in the country in recent years. You've mentioned your Chu Yibing Cellists Ensemble, so what prompted you to do that? Why is that important to you?

Chu: For me, chamber music is like Mount Everest. Our cello ensemble has played almost 600 charity concert during these last 15 years, all over the country. You know classical music is just like classic poetry from Tang and Song dynasty, you can read it yourself, but it's not interesting, you must do it publicly.

Shen: We're living in the digital age. And artificial intelligence is the hot topic now. So do you think there's room for it in the musical world? Or is there something that AI just cannot replace?

Chu: You know the difference between technique and art? Technique without revolution is nothing, but please let me tell you, real art, doesn't need any revolution, it's timeless. That's the main difference. So we can use technique including AI technique, but please, not part of art.