Zhan gained his fame when he won the top prize of a folk instrumental music competition (bamboo flute group) held by the Ministry of Culture in the 1980s. Over the past few decades, Zhan has won in many domestic and overseas competitions for his excellent bamboo flute performances and composition works. He has nurtured numerous bamboo flute performers and has made great efforts on the academic researches on the Chinese bamboo flute culture. So far, Zhan has given performances and lectures in over 20 countries and regions.
Zhan is one of the world’s representative figures of the bamboo flute music and he was the first outstanding Chinese orchestra musician to represent China to visit Taiwan. In 1988, Zhan was awarded as the national first-class performer. In 1991, he enjoyed the special subsidy offered by the State Council. In 1997, he moved to Singapore and became a teacher of the Singapore Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts. He was recruited as a folk music professor by the SHCM in 2004. In 2013, his main course of the bamboo flute music was listed as a key course by Shanghai Municipal Education Commission and a high-quality course by the SHCM. In 2016 and 2017, he was appointed as the chief professor of the SHCM Chinese Orchestra. His stories have been recorded in books including the Famous Figures of the Contemporary Arts Circles in China.
