He Bozhong (about 1820 ¡«1874), nick named as Yu Yi and Xian Ji, the fourth son of He Gaorao, was named Bozhong the Fourth by his countrymen.
The farther of He Bozhong ¨C He Gaorao was the millionaire in the county, owning more than 100 acres of land (about 70 hectares) with 14 big houses. His home was located in the street named as ¡°Gao Yao Xiang¡± with his farther¡¯ name, later renamed as ¡°Gao Yao Lane¡¯.
Due to his farther¡¯s fortunes, He Bozhong and his brothers lived in a comfortable life. Thus he was able to contribute his whole life to study arts. During the period of his attending private school, he was smart enough, with rich imagination and talents. He was interested in calligraphy, as well as good at painting. He loved the study on Shawan Piaose, as well as playing the lute (Pipa) and lyre; he was passionate in Cantonese Opera, and also had great passion on Canton music creation. During the Daoguang Regime in Qing Dynasty (between 1835~1850) he was 16 to 40 years old, it was his peak period on folk art creation, especially his great contribution on reforming and innovation for Canton music, which made him popular beyond Guangdong Province.
He Zhang (Hua Dan, namely diva, a female role in Chinese opera) was a house boy for He Bozhong since his childhood. He was found to be a boy good at speech with rich emotions by He Bozhong, and considered to have great potential for being a Canton opera actor, so he was trained to master all kinds of basic skills on Canton Opera by He Bozhong. At last, He Zhang became a famous opera artist under his teaching and training in early Canton opera era. Later on, he fought together and contributed a lot with his counterparts to achieve the unforbidden Canton opera.
Bozhong specialized in playing lute (Pipa). In order to enrich its expressive force, he created the playing skills with 10 fingers, which was called the "Ten Fingers Pipa". And it has determined unique playing techniques for Sha Wan He style Pipa, and established the solid foundation for his successors, which has been adopted widely.
He was interested to study classical (including Beiqu), often to add some extra tone to make the playing more pleasant and smooth, which has become a feature of Canton music. He collected sorted out the popular folk tunes, which has contributed a lot on the Canton music¡¯s preservation and promotion.
He also created a large number of Guangdong music, but never signed on his works, except for the draft works Yu Da Bajiao