Entertainment

“Watching online concerts on the weekend has become a kind of popular way of entertainment.”

— TME, music streaming platform

Going to a co concert in a giant stadium and screaming with other fans or appreciating dramas and o operas silently in a theater a are all important forms of ente entertainment for urban people people, but the virus f forced d people l to give up these pleasures.

So, they turned to the internet, and online performances gained popularity.

A free online concert held by Mayday, a band on the island of Taiwan, was launched on the last day of May and the number of views showed the potential of online concerts.

The livestream drew in more than 35 million viewers on China’s Tencent Music and swept across Chinese social media.

The concert was broadcast from the Taipei Municipal Stadium, the site of the band’s first major concert after their debut. While the venue normally seats thousands, due to the epidemic, no audiences were in attendance.

But cameras and the internet relayed their performance around the world in real time.

Music companies like Tencent Music captured the trend and launched the service of livestreaming concerts.

An employee of Tencent Music Live ( TME Live) surnamed Chen told the Global Times that their channel was found in March when the coronavirus had not been brought under control.

“We have held an online concert every weekend since March 10 and the channel provides a variety of ways for fans and celebrities to interact with each other,” Chen said. “All the live concerts have been aired on the platform for more than 100 million times, involving hundreds of millions of music fans.”

Overseas musicians also joined in the project of livestreaming music. Dua Lipa held her “Studio 2054” and Billie Eilish’s “WHERE DO WE GO? THE LIVESTREAM” was presented on TME Live.

When the epidemic was gradually controlled in China, many theaters and cinemas re- opened around the country, but the online performances did not vanish.