Hi James,
I don't know about the crash, but on Ubuntu you can observe all the Chinese fonts available to lilypond with:
$ lilypond -dshow-available-fonts 2>&1 | grep CJK
family Noto Sans Mono CJK JP
Noto Sans Mono CJK JP,Noto Sans Mono CJK JP Bold:style=Bold,Regular
family Noto Sans Mono CJK KR
Noto Sans Mono CJK KR,Noto Sans Mono CJK KR Bold:style=Bold,Regular
family Noto Sans CJK JP
Noto Sans CJK JP,Noto Sans CJK JP Bold:style=Bold,Regular
family Noto Sans CJK JP
Noto Sans CJK JP,Noto Sans CJK JP Thin:style=Thin,Regular
family Noto Sans CJK SC
Noto Sans CJK SC,Noto Sans CJK SC Bold:style=Bold,Regular
family Noto Sans CJK SC
Noto Sans CJK SC,Noto Sans CJK SC Thin:style=Thin,Regular
...
or similar. [I have installed all the CKJ Noto series.]