Hundred people gathering online Commemorating the third anniversary of the passing of Bay Area art promoter Ann Woo.
From VIP and Friends |
From Diana Ding and Dennis Nahat |
From Ann’s husband John Chu and Daughter Tina |
From Andy Jian and Yang Yang |
Kansen Chu, California State Assembly
Evan Low, California State Assembly
Orrin Mahoney, Former Mayor of Cupertino, Rotary District Governor
Gilbert Wong, Governing Board of Trustee at Foothill-De Anza Community College District, Former Mayor of Cupertino
Patrick Kwok, Former Mayor of Cupertino
Mythili Kumar, dancer, teacher, and choreographer
Paul Fong, Former California State Assembly
Hung Wei, Governing Board Member, Fremont Union High School District
Fariba Nejat, President of Iranian Federated Women’s Club
Phil Zhihua Young, Composer
Xingjiu Liu, dancer, teacher
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Opening Remark by Diana Ding, President of Ding Ding TV
Ann Woo’s achievements introduction by Dennis Nahat, Director of International Performing Arts Festival
Commemorating the third anniversary of the passing of Bay Area art promoter Ann Woo: From Diana Ding and Dennis Nahat
world that have had such a tremendous history and impact on us all both past and present. Her life and career
was varied, from creating new works, to founding new organizations headquartered the Silicon Valley.
Ann’s vision and projections throughout her leadership in her community along with her company of performers brought together dozens of the creative and performing arts organizations in San Jose and the greater Silicon Valley Bay Area. With some of the most ambitious collaborative programming anywhere, her work continues today at full steam as a testament to the greater need of arts and education in our communities. She fostered and cultivated an international center in the heart of the Silicon Valley that few can rival anywhere in the United States. Her drive to create an all-inclusive comprehensive umbrella for the arts has been her driving force.The list of accomplishments by Ann Woo is tremendous. She helped to create a better educational and accessible
information system for children and students in every community throughout the world, using her electronic
engineering background.
She stood by her political believes and high standards in life and separated politics from her everyday living as a
righteous, giving human being – and she separated them brilliantly.
to make them into a beautiful necklace. Ann was a precious gemstone, a craftswomen silently threading us all
together.
Ann strived to inspire everyone to learn more about her Chinese culture, history, and its contribution to
world civilization in ancient and contemporary times. During the process, she hoped they would be inspired to
learn more about their own culture and history as well. And no one wanted to know more about others then Ann
Woo. I told her once that, because of her beliefs she should be president of the United States. She said, “Ah, go on
– it’s natural to think that – isn’t it?
2002 – established CPAA Arts Center
2003 – resigned from her High-tech engineering job took her financial wealth and invested it all into creating a multi culture multi discipline school and arts center.
2008 – moved her facility from Valco Center to a new 14,000 square foot facility
2014 – established 5 youth groups, orchestral, choir, After school, Cirque San Jose, and invited me to establish a new ballet School which by that time inhabited 10 studios and a 35’ x 30’ stage.
together at CPAA including Opera, Music, Indian Dance, Shaolin, Kung Fu, Children’s Choir, Orchestra, Piano
Ballet and Chinese Classical Dance to name a few!
Found CPAA.
At every moment in her life, Ann’s mind was in full focus.
Ann Woo’s Story by John Zhu, Ann’s husband
Family Representative – Tina Wu Fredericks. Ann’s daughter
Click to Watch:
Commemorating the third anniversary of the passing of Bay Area art promoter Ann Woo: From Ann’s husband John Chu and Daughter Tina
I want to thank all the family and friends who worked tirelessly to put this memorial event together. And want to thank all the guests for attending and keeping the memory of Ann Woo and what she represents in our hearts. When I think of my mother I think of how smart she was. She would find the solution to a problem while everyone is still thinking. I can still see her now saying, “Well of course that’s the answer!” and wave her hand at us. Most importantly, I think she will be remembered most for her passion and love for art. I may not know how to speak Chinese but it was my mom who passed on to me a strong sense of pride in my Chinese heritage. I grew up rehearsing and performing Chinese folk dances. As a young girl, I remember waiting backstage for my turn and watching the beautiful dances, being enraptured at the beauty. Ann was a leader in bringing many cultures together in performance art. I imagine what would my mother do today amidst the health, economic, and environmental crisis. I think she would do what she always does, keep working hard, creating something new to bring a community together to help each other. She would do what needs to be done, because that’s the person she was. I’d like to think I’m carrying on her legacy of bringing a community together that cares and loves each other. Nine months ago, I launched my campaign for school board to be a champion for public schools in southern California. And while I’m part of the ethnic minority Chinese in my community, we are all the same deep down as human beings. My mother understood our children are our future and we must truly invest in them. I hope I can carry on her legacy of love and hope.
Tina Wu Fredericks lives in Pasadena with her husband and two daughters, ages ten and thirteen. She is a candidate for Pasadena Unified School Board. Election is on Nov. 3, 2020 www.Tina4pusd.com
IPAA, Legacy Continue by Andy Jian, president of IPAA
International Performing Art Festival & Artists introduction by Yang Yang, Executive Director of IPAA
Click the following to watch:
Commemorating the third anniversary of the passing of Bay Area art promoter Ann Woo: From Andy Jian and Yang Yang
From Andy Jian:
Hi, my name is Andy JianI am the president of international Performing Arts of America (IPAA). I had the honor working with Ann during her last 13 years at CPAA Arts Center.I experienced her passion for Arts, and her love for people.Her dignity, dedication, and devotion set a standard for me and the people around her.After she passed away, I left the Arts Center, and so did most of the professional dancers and teachers. But all the people around her, Ann’s husband, John Chu, Ann’s good friends, Dennis Nahat, Diana Ding, the dancers, encouraged me and said we need to continue her legacy.We also got strong financial support from many Ann’s good friends, we formed a new nonprofit company called IPAA 3 years ago.
Our goal is to continue Ann’s mission to promote diverse Arts and Culture in main stream America. We started organizing yearly multicultural performances.
Here is a short video showing some of the performances we did in the last 2 years at California Theater from our professional team.
This year, we were going to do the 3rd performance in October but cancelled due to the Pandemic. But the team did not stop preparing, practicing, we even leveraged the stay at home and did more extensive training, almost daily.
When Ann passed away, I thought we will never see a great hero like Ann in our life time.
But looking back the past 3 years, I realized I was wrong.
We have found the next generation raising star.
Our next speaker, recruited by Ann Woo from Beijing, her talent, passion and her team work skill gave us the confidence that Ann’s legacy not only will continue, it will be even expanded to what Ann wished to accomplish.
Now let me introduce you our world class executive director Yang Yang to talk about her team and next year.
| Kansen Chu, California State Assembly | Evan Low, California State Assembly | Orrin Mahoney, Former Mayor of Cupertino, Rotary District Governor |
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| Gilbert Wong, Governing Board of Trustee at Foothill-De Anza Community College District, Former Mayor ofCupertino | Paul Fong, Former California State Assembly | Patrick Kwok, Former Mayor of Cupertino, Advisor of IPAA |
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| Hung Wei, Governing Board Member, Fremont Union High School District | Mythili Kumar, dancer, teacher, and choreographer | Phil Zhihua Young, Composer |
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| Fariba Nejat, President of Iranian Federated Women’s Club | Xingjiu Liu, dancer, teacher | |
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My name is Phil Young and my Chinese name is 杨智华, I am a composer. I met Ann in the late 1980’s and started writing music for her soon after. I became music director for the Chinese Performing Artists of America right after she founded it in 1991. During those 20 some years working with her as a resident composer, I composed and produced music for quite a few productions for the CPAA, including the “Dragon 2000”, “Legend of Dragon King”, “Symphonic Chinese Ballet” and one of Ann’s most ambitious projects, the full length ballet “Middle Kingdom Ancient China”, a groundbreaking collaboration with the San Jose Ballet, which also brought me the opportunity to work with the ballet’s artistic director and choreographer Dennis Nahat.
During those days I was working with Ann, one thing struck me most was herselfless dedication to what she believed in and what she was trying to achieve. She believed in multiculturalism and she believed that art can unite people from different cultural backgrounds. She was striking to create a performing art form that can combine dance, music and visual art together and showcase multicultural richness on the stage for the audience, and she had achieved it beautifully.
She had a keen sense of innovations too, I always heard her say: we are right in the center of the Silicon Valley, we should take the advantage of the multimedia hi-tech environment, So she always encouraged me to utilize my computer music technology for our music productions, which I did, I actually did most of my music productions for the CPAA with my computer and music software. Another good example is her brilliant idea of creating a glowing dragon on the stage for a dragon dance called “Celestial Dragon”, dancers were asked to dressed in black dancing in the darkness under blacklight, so the dragon would come to life rolling and shining on the stage, with my computer-generated thundering druming track, the outcome is stunning and it became the signature show of the CPAA for years to come.
Ann’s passing is a tremendous loss for the community, but her legacy will live on and she will be remembered by all of us. I personally treasure the good memories working with her. I will never forget the moment while we were visiting her in the hospital when she was in a coma, we were not allowed to enter the room she was in, but before I left I shouted at the ICU door toward her : “We love you Ann!”……., I hope she heard my words.
Organizing team:
John Chu, Husband to Ann Woo
Andy Jian, President of IPAA
Dennis Nahat, Director of International Performing Arts Festival
Yang Yang, Executive Director of IPAA
Diana Ding, President of Ding Ding TV, Silicon Valley Innovation Channel
Sandy Wang, COO, Ding Ding TV, Silicon Valley Innovation Channel