What’s on
Travel: Wonderland with giant ice castles
Ice Castles is a 0.40 hectare castle in William Hawrelak Park, Canada. Complete with icicle ceilings and frozen thrones, it is a stunning Narnia-like place where visitors can take selfies against popular backdrops, including a throne room, a waterfall and inside an ice maze. About 9 million kilograms of ice is stretched into tall towers and tunnels. More than 20 workers started creating the castle in November, working icicle by icicle, and eventually using 10,000. The icicles are grown on racks
Nocturnes No 2 in E flat major No 20 in C sharp minor
Theater: Films for Spring Festival holiday
Thirteen films are preparing to hit the big screen on Feb 5, when China will celebrate Spring Festival. Comedies are the most prominent offerings this season, followed by animations and science fiction. The latest online ticket sales figures from the box office tracker Maoyan show the films have already brought in 10 million yuan ($1.5 million) for the day. Chinese New Year is traditionally a time for family gatherings. This year’s holiday runs from Feb 4 to 10.
Shanghai Xinyi Chinese Chamber Music Group New Year Traditional Concert
Date:
Venue:
Jan 19 — 7:30 pm
Shanghai City Theater Traditional Chinese chamber music was overlooked when modern styles such as pop and rock became popular after the launch of the reform and opening-up policy. In fact, many people consider the style to be out of date.
Dai Deyue, operating manager of the Shanghai Xinyi Chinese Chamber Music Group, aims to dispel such notions and to illustrate that the style has evolved through a series of fresh and revolutionary works.
The instruments used in the performances include a mixture of traditional Chinese and foreign, including percussion from South America.
Earlier this month, Evelina De Lain set a world record for the highest classical concert when she played a grand piano at an altitude of 5,000 meters in the Himalayas. She performed Chopin’s
and during the 90-minute high-altitude performance. The 41-year-old musician lost the ability to move her hands properly 14 years ago as a result of repetitive strain injury. However, after an intensive therapy, she has regained much of her former dexterity.
Liu Zhenjian, 28, started his rural business after learning about methods of planting succulents.
In 2016, he rented a greenhouse in Hengshui, Hebei province, and started from scratch, learning how to cultivate and maintain the plants, and developing a market for them. Now, the business has expanded to three greenhouses covering 6,000 square meters in total. Liu sells his products nationwide via the internet, social media and bricks-and-mortar stores, earning annual revenue of about 200,000 yuan ($30,000).
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part of the orchestra’s profile. Social projects underline the commitment of every one of the musicians.
The repertoire of the orchestra is diverse — symphony concerts with major symphonic works, such as Berlioz’s
operatic productions, Mozart’s
gala performances and crossover projects illustrate the orchestra’s range.
Ning An & Yuan-Pu Chiao: J.S. Bach
Jan 19 — 7:30 pm
Shanghai Oriental Art Center
Born in December, 1976, Ning An began his musical studies at the Cleveland Institute of Music with Olga Radosavljevich and Sergei Babayan. He subsequently continued his studies under the tutelage of Russell Sherman at the New England Conservatory.
He currently serves as the Artist-Teacher at the piano faculty of California State University, Fullerton School of Music.
Yuan-Pu Chiao was born in Taipei. He is a doctor of music at King’s College London and a researcher at the British Library’s Edison Fellowship. He is a well-known music critic and senior columnist in Taiwan.
Date: Venue: Julien Brocal Piano Recital Date:
Venue:
Jan 20 — 7:30 pm
National Centre for the Performing Arts, Beijing
Winner of BBC Music Magazine’s 2018 Newcomer of the Year Award, Brocal began learning piano at the age of 5 and first performed on stage at the Salle Cortot (Paris) at the age of 7.
He was spotted in January 2013 by Maria Joao Pires during a course at the Cite de la Musique (Paris) and she subsequently invited him to develop artistic projects at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel and become one of the founding members of the Partitura Project.
Since then, they have performed together at numerous concerts across the world, including with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra at the prestigious Chopin Festival, the L’Opera di Firenze in the Great Artists Series, the Sheldonian Theatre (Oxford, England), and Philharmonie de Paris.
Deutsche Philharmonie Bonn New Year‘s Concert Date:
Venue:
Jan 26 — 7:30 pm
Shanghai Poly Grand Theater
The Deutsche Philharmonie Bonn is highly professional, passionate and promising, with energetic and enthusiastic playing. Eager and intense, the orchestra presents itself on stage as one of the best free orchestras in Germany.
Its history makes it clear that this is not a simple symphony orchestra. Ambitious projects that have already found imitators, such as Music for All, are Fantastique, the Seraglio,
National Center for the Performing Arts, Beijing
Feb 6-10 — 7:30 pm Rhythm of the Dance continues the Lord of the Dance and Riverdance legacies with a performance that combines Irish step dancing with toe-tapping live music and a smattering of Latin rhythms.
The show is an inspiring epic, reliving the journey of the Irish throughout history. Using modern art forms of dance and music, this richly costumed show marries the contemporary and the ancient.
Combining traditional dance and music with the most up-todate stage technology, the show is a 1,000-year-old story delivered with all the advantages of modern stage shows.
Date: Date:
Symphonie Abduction from
Valentina Lisitsa Piano Recital Date:
Venue:
Feb 14 — 7:30 pm
National Centre for the Performing Arts, Beijing
Valentina Lisitsa is the first classical artist to convert internet success into a global concert career in the principal venues of Europe, the US, South America and Asia.
She posted her first video on social media in 2007, a recording of the Etude, Op. 39/6 by Rachmaninoff. Her account has 346,000 subscribers and 147 million views with an average of 75,000 hits per day.
Her discography contains recordings of every piano concerto by Rachmaninoff, works by Chopin, Philipp Glass, Liszt and Scriabin as well as her latest CD Love Story — Piano Themes from the Cinema’s Golden Age
featuring major film music from the 1920s.
The Wurttemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn Date:
Venue:
Feb 17 — 7:30 pm
National Centre for the Performing Arts, Beijing
The Wurttemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn sets high standards with its stylistically assured versatility and its implemented ideal of chamber music.
The orchestra’s principal conductor Ruben Gazarian expanded the standard repertoire in a remarkable way by enlarging the ensemble’s symphonic scale and choosing compositions from the Romantic and Modern eras, as well as avant-garde pieces. He has worked successfully with renowned soloists such as Gautier and Renaud Capucon, Julia Fischer and Hilary Hahn.
In September 2002, Gazarian became laureate at the first Sir Georg Solti International Conducting Competition in Frankfurt, Germany.
Cellist Gabriel Faur has won several competitive events, such as the David Popper International Cello Competition in Hungary and the Johannes Brahms Competition in Austria, and has performed as a soloist and chamber musician.