Local and Chinese Music Talents to Celebrate National Day
HK Phil – A National Day Celebration (25 & 26 September)

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[8 September 2015, Hong Kong] The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra (HK Phil) will celebrate the National Day on 25 & 26 September. In the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall, the HK Phil, soprano Louise Kwong, conductor Rachel Jiemin Zhang and pianist Niu Niu (Zhang Shengliang) will perform traditional Chinese songs as well as music by Tchaikovsky.

Celebrate National Day with Tchaikovsky’s immortal Piano Concerto no. 1. The HK Phil is proud to introduce emerging piano star Niu Niu, an eighteen year-old prodigy who will take on this great romantic concerto, which was spurned by Nikolai Rubinstein but loved by many audiences.

Hong Kong Arts Development Council Young Artist Award winner, Hong Kong’s own vocal virtuoso Louise Kwong will be bringing us two Chinese folk songs and the dazzling Lisa’s Aria from Tchaikovsky’s Opera Queen of Spades, which is based on a short story by Alexander Pushkin.

Conductor Rachel Jiemin Zhang will direct the Chinese orchestral work, A Wonder of Naxi, which in its four movements depicts the unique characteristics and culture of the Nakhi ethnic group in the north-western part of Yunnan Province.

Holiday & Pops: A National Day Celebrations will be held on 25 & 26 September(Fri & Sat), 8PM in the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall.Tickets priced: HK$480, $380, $280, $180 are now available at URBTIX. For enquiries, please call +852 2721 2332 or visit www.hkphil.org.

Opening performance is sponsored by Sunwah Kingsway Capital Holdings Ltd.
26 Sep performance is sponsored by Wing Lung Bank.
 

Artists
Rachel Jiemin Zhang, conductor [full biography]
Rachel Jiemin Zhang is the first female conductor to conduct at both Teatro La Fenice and San Carlo Opera House. She is currently the Conductor in Residence at the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, and has worked with the Shanghai Philharmonic and China Philharmonic.

Louise Kwong, soprano [full biography]
Louise Kwong has won numerous singing competitions and awards include Audience Prize and the Best Soprano Prize in the 18th International Singing Competition “Ferruccio Tagliavini” in Austria. Louise is also the winner of the Young Artist Award of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council in 2004.

Niu Niu, piano [full biography]
Niu Niu was made Laureate of the 2010 PRIX Montblanc in 2010, which is an annual award for young emerging instrumentalists in the classical music world. He has performed at London’s Royal Festival Hall, Wigmore Hall, the Beijing National Center for Performing Arts, Suntory Hall Tokyo and Symphony Hall Osaka.

Holiday & Pops: National Day Concerts
25 & 26 | 9 | 2015
FRI & SAT 8PM
Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall
HK$480 $380 $280 $180
Tickets are now available at URBTIX
For ages 6 and above

Click the thumbnail to download photos
Rachel Jiemin Zhang	Niu Niu	Louise Kwong
The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra Photo: Philip Chau/HK Phil

Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra
Music Director: Jaap van Zweden

The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra (HK Phil) has recently returned from an extremely successful five-country, seven-city tour of Europe, with concerts in London, Vienna, Zurich, Eindhoven, Birmingham, Berlin and Amsterdam. Most concerts were sold out, there were standing ovations, and the reviews were universally positive. The concert in Vienna’s Musikverein was filmed for broadcast on TV. With a history stretching back to 1895, when it was formed as the Sino-British Orchestra, the HK Phil was re-named in 1957 and became fully professional in 1974.

Thanks to significant subsidy from the Hong Kong Government and long-term funding from Principal Patron Swire, the Hong Kong Jockey Club and other supporters, the HK Phil now boasts a full-time annual schedule of classical music concerts, pops concerts, an extensive education programme, and collaborations for staged opera with Opera Hong Kong and the Hong Kong Arts Festival.

Conductors and soloists who have recently performed with the orchestra include Vladimir Ashkenazy, Ning Feng, Matthias Goerne, Lang Lang, Yu Long, Yundi Li, the late Lorin Maazel, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Yuja Wang and Edo de Waart, the HK Phil’s previous Music Director.

The HK Phil promotes the work of Hong Kong and Chinese composers through an active commissioning programme, and has released recordings featuring Tan Dun and Bright Sheng, each conducting their own compositions, on the Naxos label. Its acclaimed community engagement programme brings music to ten of thousands of children annually. A recording was issued free to schoolchildren throughout Hong Kong of Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf and Leopold Mozart’s Toy Symphony.

This season is Jaap van Zweden’s fourth as Music Director of the HK Phil. With him, the orchestra is undertaking major expansion and new projects, including the first-ever performances by a Hong Kong or mainland Chinese orchestra of Wagner’s The Ring of the Nibelung. The four operas are being performed, one a year, in concert and recorded live for the Naxos label.

The Swire Group has been the Principal Patron of the HK Phil since 2006. Through this sponsorship, which is the largest in the orchestra’s history, Swire also endeavours to promote artistic excellence, foster access to classical music and stimulate cultural participation in Hong Kong, and to enhance Hong Kong’s reputation as one of the great cities of the world.

The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra is financially supported by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region
SWIRE is the Principal Patron of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra
The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra is a Venue Partner of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre