Notes from the past Share CLOSE At 92, Zheng Xiaoying is China's first female orchestral conductor following the founding of People's Republic of China in 1949.[Photo provided to China Daily] Accomplished conductor Zheng Xiaoying brings a composition about the history and lives of the Hakka people to the nation's capital, Chen Nan reports. Despite a lifetime of achievement, most notably, perhaps, being the country's first female orchestral conductor following the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, Zheng Xiaoying, at the age of 92, still feels that she has some unfinished business. She simply has a desire to introduce The Echoes of Hakka's Earth Buildings, an original Chinese music piece composed by Liu Yuan about the Hakka people's history and lives, to as many people as possible.