appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

isVideo

articlePageQuery

article

articleSchemaContent

content

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

hooksArticlePageFloatingButtonConfigArticle

appConfig

filter

json

liveArticle

Ken Smith

The Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra (HKCO) has come up with some pretty way out concepts over the years, but they have usually had their feet on the ground.
Its production for the closing weekend of the 2023 Hong Kong Arts Festival, entitled “The Stage Door on Mars”, took a somewhat extraterrestrial approach, however.
Conceived by composer and music producer Ng King-pan, the 75-minute multimedia presentation was set in both the past and the future. It recalled the premieres of Cantonese operas from the 1950s to the 1970s, and imagined a time when humans will have built concert halls on both the moon and Mars.
It opened with “Death of a Princess on the Moon”, an elaborately scored arrangement of the famed finale of Princess Changping (1957) by Tong Tik-sang which, accompanied by Carmen Cheng’s futuristic staging, transported the audience to a glass concert hall within the Chinese space station on the moon in 2047. That year will mark the 50th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty and 90 years since Princess Changping’s premiere in the old Lee Theatre in Causeway Bay.

To finish the concert, the orchestra played “Reunion of the Sword and the Hairpin on Mars”, an arrangement of the reconciliation scene from the Story of the Purple Hairpin (1957), also by Tong. That piece was performed for the imagined centenary celebration of the premiere and to inaugurate a recital hall at a Chinese space station on Mars in 2057.
At risk of causing chronological whiplash, the rest of the programme was rooted in events some in the audience might have remembered, beginning with an excerpt from Romance of the Phoenix Chamber, whose premiere was part of the opening performances of the Hong Kong City Hall in 1962.

After a reprise of Chang Wing-shou’s Cantonese Tunes Melody, which marked the HKCO’s own beginning during the 1977 Festival of Asian Arts, the orchestra then offered “The Chance Meeting When Plucking the Prunes” to commemorate the world premiere of The Reincarnation of Lady Plum Blossom at the Lee Theatre in 1959.
HKCO music director Yan Huichang deftly conducted Ng’s sparkling arrangements. Cantonese opera vocalists Man Wah and Leung Fei-tung, singing male and female roles respectively, offered tributes to famous Cantonese stage pairings (most notably Yam Kim-fai and Pak Suet-sin, as well as Mak Ping-wing and Fung Wong Nui) without subsuming themselves to the past.
Cheng’s set smartly utilised the choir stalls behind the orchestra and the boxes on either side of the stage, and the multisensory feast was enriched by Michelle Tang’s highly adaptable costumes, Chan Wing’s projections, Mak Kwok-fai’s lighting, Ha Yan-pui’s sound designs and Sierra Tse’s electronic soundscape.
New musical about modern China’s ‘founding father’ Sun Yat-sen is flawed
Notable instrumental solos came from gehu player Tung Hiu Lo, suona player Ma Wai Him and pipa player Zhong Ying. Lead percussionist Wong Yat-yin literally had a stage of her own.
The point of the afternoon, as explained in the programme book, and thinly veiled onstage, was to pay tribute to the sheer adaptability of Cantonese music, in particular its stage tradition.
Ng’s Dragon Teases the Phoenix juxtaposes the Cantonese set tune Autumn Moon on Placid Lake with the “Toreador Song” from Bizet’s Carmen. His arrangement of the “Consoling His Wife” duet from Why Won’t Thou Return, ostensibly inspired by a landmark 1972 televised charity performance, becomes a tour-de-force juxtaposition of Cantonese tune types with jazzy orchestrations, including the signature tune from TVB’s long-running variety show Enjoy Yourself Tonight.
Few art forms have proved so pliable yet durable as Cantonese opera, receptive to any melodies and musical styles that pass by while remaining remarkably distinctive.
I’m still not sure why we had to drag space travel into the picture – the afternoon’s biggest leap of imagination was trying to picture City Hall as a music venue of the future – but it was a proud and triumphant celebration of the art form’s present.
“Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra: The Stage Door on Mars”, Hong Kong Arts Festival, Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall. Reviewed: March 18, 3pm.


Could hit musical Hamilton be coming to Hong Kong in 2027?

Hong Kong Ballet to move to city’s first dedicated dance venue in 2027

The inspiring story of Hong Kong dancer and filmmaker who began at 48 after leaving Apple

Hong Kong theatre legend Fredric Mao launches foundation to boost city’s performing arts

Performing arts in Hong Kong

Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra concert a triumphant celebration of the adaptability of Cantonese opera and music

The Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra performing “The Stage Door on Mars” at the Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall as part of the 2023 Hong Kong Arts Festival, with Man Wah and Leung Fei-tung (on elevated stage) singing arias from famous Cantonese operas. Photo: HKCO

The Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra performing “The Stage Door on Mars”, which marked a series of Cantonese opera and performance anniversaries. Photo: HKCO 

Elaborate lighting and effects were a feature of the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra’s production “The Stage Door on Mars”. Photo: HKCO

Melodrama reinvented as a TED Talk for the operatic stage, The Book of Water starring Samuel and Timothy West is a multimedia spectacle

A scene from “The Book of Water” featuring Samuel West (live on stage) and his father, Timothy West (in a pre-recorded video), a polished multimedia spectacle about natural disaster and personal renewal performed in Hong Kong as part of the Hong Kong Arts Festival. Photo:  Michel Schnater 

A scene from “The Book of Water”, a multimedia spectacle that combines live music and narration with film and pre-recorded sound. Photo: Michel Schnater 

Father and son actors Samuel (front, on stage) and Timothy (rear, on film) in a scene from “The Book of Water”. Photo: Michel Schnater

Like father, like son – a scene from “The Book of Water”, performed in Hong Kong as part of the Hong Kong Arts Festival. Photo: Michel Schnater 

In The Book of Water’s most original moment, Geiser (played by Timothy West on film, left) starts talking and inhabiting the same space as his younger self. Photo: Michel van der Aa 

Oscar-winning Chinese composer Tan Dun on why ‘Hong Kong is home’, his new role as city’s cultural ambassador and upcoming ‘immersive opera’

Tan Dun speaks to the Post in Hong Kong. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

Oscar-winning Chinese-American composer Tan Dun is Hong Kong’s new Ambassador for Cultural Promotion. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

Tan Dun conducts the Philadelphia Orchestra in a concert in the United States in 2019. Photo: Xinhua

Tan Dun holding the Oscar he won for best original score, for his work on Ang Lee’s film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Photo: AFP

Placido Domingo (left) and Tan Dun speak at a news conference in 2006 during the production of Tan’s The First Emperor. Photo: AFP

Tan will present what he calls an “immersive opera” in Hong Kong on December 10 and 11 inspired by the Chi Lin Nunnery and the Buddhist art of China’s Dunhuang caves. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

Tan has long been known for his affinity with unconventional and rare instruments. Photo: Getty Images

Tan has many ideas for future productions in Hong Kong. Photo: Xiaomei Chen 

Lifestyle

Arts

Culture

Music

The Chinese-instruments orchestra billed its Hong Kong Arts Festival ‘The Stage Door on Mars’ as a means to celebrate Cantonese opera anniversaries
Featuring arrangements by Ng King-pan, imaginative staging by Carmen Cheng, and Cantonese opera vocalists Man Wah and Leung Fei-tung, this was a worthy tribute


Forget the futuristic title “The Stage Door on Mars” given this production – it was very much a tribute to the present-day vibrancy of Cantonese opera and music.


Hong Kong Arts Festival

Cantonese culture, slang and customs

Chinese culture

An assessment or critique of a service, product or creative endeavour.  Film reviews, restaurant reviews, reviews of art exhibitions. (Eg. Crazy Rich Asians: an important film, yes, but a good one?)


Review