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June 24, 2016

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With split season, Opera House celebrates 60th

SHANGHAI Opera House will initiate its first Symphony & Chorus Season with a total of 22 performances between October and July to mark its 60th anniversary.

With a focus on opera, symphony, chorus and dance, Shanghai Opera House has decided to divide its traditional season into two parts for the first time in order to give each performance enough room to fully develop.

The Symphony & Chorus Season will stage concerts, while the Opera & Dance Season will follow up next year with operas and dances. Operas in concert, symphony concerts, chamber concerts, chorus concerts and vocal solo concerts guarantee a variety of entertainment.

Pietro Mascagni’s opera “Cavalleria Rustricana” and Ruggero Leoncavallo’s “Pagliacci” will be staged as opera in concert. Star tenors Wei Song, Shi Yijie and Han Peng will sing together at the “Voice of Glory — Shanghai Three Tenors Concert.”

The Shanghai Opera House Chorus will mix Chinese classic chorus pieces and Western ones for the “Communication and Inspiration” concert, and Zhang Guoyong will conduct a symphony concert of works by Strauss and Mahler by the Shanghai Opera House Orchestra.

“Apart from the leading roles, most of the opera house members, whether as members of the chorus or orchestra, are playing assisting roles in a traditional opera. Their talents are not fully presented, or — to some extend — not examined. I hope this opportunity will not only help them to shine, but also urge the members to improve,” says Xu Zhong, the new president of Shanghai Opera House.

The concert version of the original opera “In Which Direction the Wind is Blowing” will be one of the season’s highlights.

The opera is based on the love life of poet Xu Zhimo. Although most adaptations focus on his relationship with Lin Huiyin or Lu Xiaoman, Li Ruixiang, the playwright and composer of the opera, was impressed more by the romance between Xu and Zhang Youyi.

Even though their relationship was doomed, Zhang kept taking care of Xu’s parents and helped publish a collection of Xu’s poems after his death.

“Xu may be frozen when encountering ice-like Lin, and burn when approaching fire-like Lu. But Zhang is always worried about him as she has always loved him,” says Li. “Many people tend to talk about this romance just as a romance, but it took me quite a long time to ponder on what is behind the romance. I believe that the sparkle of humanity is always worth digging out.”

 

Tickets: 80-380 yuan

Visit www.shanghaiopera.com.cn for more information.




 

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