Fan Shengwu entered the Shanghai Conservatory as a student of composition in 1955, the following year concertrating his attention on conducting, under distinguished Russian and Chinese teachers. In 1959 he conducted the first performance of the best known of all Chinese orchestral works, the Butterfly Lovers Concerto, at the Shanghai Spring Festival, and after graduation in 1960 joined the teaching staff of the Conservatory. He was subsequently appointed conductor of the Shanghai Dance School and he Shanghai Opera Orchestras. In 1965 he conducted the first performance of The White-haired Girl, a work that has won continued popularity both in the theatre and the concert-hall. Fan Shengwu has appeared frequently as a conductor with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra and with foreign orchestras, winning particular success in France in 1982, when he conducted the Lamoureux Orchestra.