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Thirty years ago, a young man named Pan Yinlin made his solo violin debut in Shanghai. The year was 1972, in the midst of the disastrous "cultural revolution" (1966-1976). The sound of a violin had not been heard for a long time, but that debut breathed new life into violin music. Pan has returned to Shanghai to commemorate the 30th anniversary of that dramatic turning point - both for himself and the instrument he loves - with a concert with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra at the Shanghai Grand Theater on March 10. He has planned a challenging program. He will be the soloist on a violin concerto of "Butterfly Lovers" by Shanghai composers Chen Gang and He Zhanhao, and also on a work by Pablo de Sarasate. With the orchestra, Pan will play on Rachmaninov's "Symphony No. 2 in E Minor." Pan was born in 1947 in Shanghai. He was just one of many children in Shanghai whose musical talents were discovered and nourished early by their educated families. Yet while many of his musical contemporaries, growing up during those turbulent times, turned away from their violins and pianos, Pan remained committed. The first stage of Pan's musical career was typical of many musicians: He started studying the violin at the age of 10 and entered the professional music education system. That beginning may have been unremarkable, but his first teacher was not: Pan received his early instruction from Wang Renyi, brother of film star Wang Renmei and once the teacher of Nie Er, the composer who wrote the national anthem of the People's Republic of China. After 10 years of study, Pan joined the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra and quickly became first violinist. The year 1966 saw the beginning of the 10-year "cultural revolution." For the arts, this meant that the well-known six "revolutionary Beijing Operas" and two "revolutionary ballets" chosen to serve as "models" reigned supreme, and Western classical music was essentially banned. Against this backdrop, Pan's career - and the popularity of violin music in general - is remarkable. "There is always a thirst for violin music," Pan says by way of explanation. The opening-up and reform in the 1980s gave Pan opportunities to travel outside of China, and in 1982, he won the first prize in a competition in Japan. Two years later he went to Japan to play with the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, where he remained for seven years. He is also the first Chinese to play concertmaster in a Japanese symphony orchestra. Pan went to Australia in 1992, and again became the first Chinese concertmaster - this time in the Australia Opera Orchestra. In 1997 and 2000, he led both the all-Chinese symphony orchestra at a concert celebrating Hong Kong's handover to the Chinese government and the orchestra at the Sydney Millennium celebration, and collaborated with conductors like Loren Mazel and Eliahu Inbal.