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After a long break due to COVID-19 the New Opera of Peking (Beijing Laiyin Sunny Opera) opens again!
It begins with its first guest performance in Europe, which will feature 12 soloists of this opera and a 80-strong choir. In this Chinese-European collaboration an European Orchestra will play: the Hungarian National Symphony Orchestra.
Artistic Director: Keqing Liu
Music Director: Helge Dorsch
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The following Opera productions are also planned for the season 2024/25:
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Giuseppe Verdi‘s „Aida“ (New Production)
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George Bizet’s „Carmen“ (Revival)
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and a special artistic highlight: Guan Xia’s classical Chinese Opera “Mulan Shige” (“Psalm of Mulan”, or “Poems of Mulan”) with the First Lady of China, Peng Liyuan, wife of China’s president Xi Jiping, in the title role. Dates to be announced.
Artistic Director: Keqing Liu
Music Director: Helge Dorsch
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Guan Xia was born in Kaifeng, and graduated from the China Central Conservatory in 1985. He has been the director of the China National Symphony Orchestra until 2018 and involved in a number of Chinese national committees working with musicians. His important works include the operas Sorrowful Dawn and Mulan Psalm, several symphonies, Earth Requiem, a piano concerto, and the Symphonic Overture No. 1 (also known as Symphonic Ballade‘Sorrowful Dawn’), which is very popular in the concerts in China. He is also famous for composing TV series soundtracks, some of which were orchestrated as concert pieces, including I Love My Family, Fortress Besieged, Little Dragonboy, The Years of Intense Emotion, and Soldiers Sortie.
Created and performed by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Performing Arts Troupe, Poems of Mulan, based on the well-known Chinese folk tale heroine Mulan who disguises herself as a man to take the place of her ailing father in the army, the work has traveled the globe, including performances at New York’s Lincoln Center in 2005 and Vienna’s National Opera House in 2008.
“Mulan is not a traditional Chinese opera nor a direct adoption of Western opera,” Guan Xia, composer of the show and president of China National Symphony Orchestra, told the Global Times.
Integrating symphony, Western opera, musical theater, drama and dance with Chinese folk music, folk tales and traditional costumes, Poems of Mulan, according to Guan, is a successful blend of East and West, enabling a Chinese opera production to find success on the international stage.
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RED STAR OVER CHINA
Chinese Opera by Jin Zhou
WORLD PREMIERE
6 October, 2019 Beijing Concert Hall
Produced by New Opera of China /Laiyin Opera
General Director: Keqing Liu
Music Director: Helge Dorsch
Based on the Bestseller by Edgar Snow
Contents:
Edgar Snow was the first Westerner to meet Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist leaders in 1936.
He came away with the first authorised account of Mao's life, as well as a history of the famous Long March and the men and women who were responsible for the Chinese revolution. Out of that experience came Red Star Over China, a classic work that remains one of the most important books ever written about the birth of the Communist movement in China.
This edition includes extensive notes on the military and political developments in China, further interviews with Mao Zedong, a chronology covering 125 years of Chinese revolution and nearly a hundred detailed biographies of the men and women who were instrumental in making China what it is today.
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CARMEN by George Bizet
BEIJING CONCERT HAlLL
November 21, 2018
Carmen: Chunqing, Zhang
Producer: Keqing Liu
Orchestra and Choir of the New Opera of Peking
(Laiyjn Opera)
Conductor: Helge Dorsch
G. Puccini: TURANDOT /New Production
30 October, 2017, Tianqiao Theatre, Beijing / Temple of Heaven Park, Peking/China
Stage Director: Keqing Liu
Conductor: Helge Dorsch
Turandot review
The Press wrote: „The best TURANDOT since the legendary production in the Forbidden City (1999)!“
Chunqing Zhang was outstanding as "Turandot", Keqing Liu`s production had world class.
Chief Conductor Helge Dorsch, who has performed in the world's greatest opera houses and festivals, brought this production to a tremendous success not only through his masterful cunducting technique and his empathy for every detail, but also through his passionate musical approach which jumped over to the orchestra and ensemble as well as to the public.
more performances in 2018/19 to be announced
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Inaugural premiere: La Traviata, opera in Italian by Giuseppe Verdi, November 8, 2016 and November 9, 2016 with two different casts. Performances will take place in Beijing's Century Theater, the same venue where the gala concert for the Laiyin Opera featuring baritone Keqing Liu was held in April, 2016 which was conducted by Maestro Helge Dorsch, who has subsequently been appointed as the artistic director of the new Laiyin Opera.
On 19 April, 2017 a Gala Concert will take place under the direction of Helge Dorsch in order to to celebrate the 60th birthday of the General Director Keqing Liu. Location: Tian Qiao Theatre (Temple of Heaven Park), Beijing.
For July, 2017 a tour of China is planned with the only existing Chinese Belcanto-Opera “The Savage Land” by Jin Xiang. Conductor: Helge Dorsch
The Savage Land (Yuanye) is a 1987 Chinese-language western-style opera by composer Jin Xiang to a libretto by Wan Fang (born 1952) after her own father Cao Yu's 1937 play The Wilderness (also Yuanye). It was performed at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington in 1992, then again in Vancouver in 1998
On 30 October 2017, Turandot, opera in Italian by Giacomo Puccini will be performed in concert version starring Chunqing Zhang in the title role and Helge Dorsch conducting. The location is very romantic and appropriate fur this opera: Tian Qiao Theatre (Theatre in the Temple of Heaven Park, Beijing)
In 2018, Turandot will be repeated in a monumental staged version. Intended venue: Gongren Tiyuchang (Workers' Stadium, Beijing)
During the performance of Turandot, there will be a mass wedding of thousands of couples from all over China, saying their vows together with Princess Turandot and Prince Kalaf on stage.
For 2018, another monumental production is planned: Carmen, opera in French by Georges Bizet, intended venue: Gongren Tiyuchang (the Workers' Stadium, Beijing)
Planning is also underway for various concerts of music for chorus and orchestra, including Beethoven's 9th symphony, conducted by Helge Dorsch and two Chinese Operas as well as Concerts featuring chamber music performed by Chinese and foreign artists.
La Traviata Cast List
La Traviata: review of the Inaugural Premiere
....the conducting of Helge Dorsch, the recently appointed Music Director and Principal Conductor of the Laiyin Opera, matched perfectly with Keqing Liu's magnificent staging.
His dynamic and spirited conducting full of verve inspired the choir and the orchestra to a truly outstanding performance.
He brought out the dramatic climaxes as well as all the subtleties of the score and perfectly underlined the emotional ups and downs of the title role La Traviata from glamorous parties to her tragic end.
The singers produced top performances under Helge Dorsch's inspiring conducting, above all Sonora Vaice as Violetta and Keqing Liu, outstanding both as a singer and as an actor.
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New Opera China, Laiyin Opera, Peking / China |
