Xiqu Centre Presents Unique Tea House Theatre Performance

The Xiqu Centre, a world-class performing arts venue, will open in the West Kowloon Cultural District in 2018 and will be dedicated to promoting the rich heritage of Chinese Opera in all of its forms

Ahead of this, Special Tea House Taster will take place with a live streaming of the performance to be held on 13 May to allow viewers from around the world to enjoy this spectacular event

The West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD) Xiqu Centre is delighted to showcase a Tea House Theatre Taster performance, which will provide a preview of the types of performances that can be enjoyed at the Xiqu Centre to be opened in late 2018. Guests from opera performing groups, education sector and tourism industries are invited to the four previews and offer their valuable advice to the special performances.

The Tea House Theatre Taster performance will be held at The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts in a specially built replica of the future Xiqu Centre’s Tea House Theatre. Emerging actors from Hong Kong’s Young Academy Cantonese Opera troupe will perform excerpts of traditional works, using a range of operatic and narrative singing techniques and wind and percussion music styles to introduce the breadth and range of Chinese opera (xiqu). The performance will be streamed live to the public via the WKCD’s official Facebook and YouTube channel on 13 May 2017 so that audiences at home and around the world over can log on to get a glimpse of the type of performances the future Xiqu Centre Tea House Theatre promises to deliver. The event is the latest in a diverse programme of Cantonese opera and other Chinese traditional theatre performances presented by the District in the run up to the Xiqu Centre opening next year.

The performance includes excerpts from ‘Exploring Myself in the Play’, a Nayin performance (a form of narrative singing that became popular in the Pearl River Delta region in the 20th century); ‘Menglong’, a wind and percussion music performance; ‘Lulang Reprimands His Son’ that showcases antique Cantonese operatic singing, written by legendary Cantonese opera librettist Tong Tik-sang in 1957; ‘Sword Reunites Hairpin Couple’ from the well-known xiqu performance ‘The Story of the Purple Hairpin’, and many more.

The Xiqu Centre will be the first major venue to open in the WKCD and will feature an auditorium that will comfortably seat 1,100, alongside a more intimate space, modeled on a traditional Chinese tea house offering a maximum of 200 audience that will present small scale productions and recitals similar to the taster performance taking place on 13 May. Once open, the Xiqu Centre will be a world-class performing arts venue and one of the largest of its kind worldwide devoted specifically to the historic art form of xiqu. Located at the Eastern edge of the WKCD in Hong Kong, the venue will be a leading facility for the preservation, development and promotion of traditional Chinese theatre and it will provide a platform for xiqu communities to interact and produce the finest examples of Cantonese and other xiqu performances and international cultural programming.

“We are immensely pleased with the progress of the construction and programming of the Xiqu Centre to date, and we look forward to presenting the Tea House Theatre Taster performance which can be viewed by audiences and opera enthusiasts all over the world via the live streaming on 13 May,” says Louis Yu Kwok-lit, Executive Director, Performing Arts of West Kowloon Cultural District Authority. “This performance allows us to prepare for the upcoming opening of the Xiqu Centre, by exploring the Tea House concept, experimenting with ideas on design, programming and operational models. It also provides us with an opportunity for comments and responses from a wide audience.”

XIQU CENTRE BUILDING & LATEST CONSTRUCTION UPDATES

Designed by Bing Thom Architects and Ronald Lu & Partners, the Xiqu Centre is one of very few contemporary examples of purpose-built venues for this art form in the world. Thoughtful and careful deliberation towards the construction of the centre has been considered, from the design of the structure, to sustainability strategies of the venue and overall preservation of xiqu.

The building design presents the spirit of xiqu embodied in a building. It successfully blends theatre, arts education and public space together and the design reflects four core design principles integral to the art form and Chinese culture: (1) the concept of ‘flow’ or ‘qi’ is represented in the curved planes, arched plaines and circular paths; (2) the concept of nature though the landscape into different levels of the building to create in-between spaces; (3) the concept of gateway and pavilion via the openness and door-less nature of the design, that ensures a welcome into the building from all four corners; and (4) the concept of a courtyard, which serves as an urban stage for events and celebrations. These four elements contribute to a landmark building for Hong Kong, which preserves and reinvents xiqu for global audiences.

A major milestone was reached in 2016 when the main theatre structure was successfully lifted to its final position at the top of the building in phases between January and May. There is now a clear impression of the scale and complexity of the building at the junction of Canton Road and Austin Road West. Construction is on target and the building is scheduled to complete in late 2017, allowing the Xiqu Centre to open to the public in late 2018.

GENERAL INFORMATION

Free live streaming date: 13 May 2017
Time: 7:30pm – 8:40pm

Digital platform:
Official Facebook of WKCD: https://www.facebook.com/westkowloon/
Official YouTube channel of WKCD: https://www.youtube.com/wkcda

Language: Cantonese with Chinese and English surtitles

Remarks

About West Kowloon Cultural District
Located on Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour, the West Kowloon Cultural District is one of the largest cultural projects in the world. Its vision is to create a vibrant new cultural quarter for Hong Kong. With a complex of theatres, performance spaces, and M+, the West Kowloon Cultural District will produce and host world-class exhibitions, performances, and cultural events, as well as provide 23 hectares of public open space, including a two kilometre waterfront promenade.

About Xiqu
Xiqu (Chinese opera) is a performing art integrating singing, acting, martial arts, music, and costume. Originating as early as the third century and once the primary genre of Chinese theatre, there were 360 forms of xiqu in the 1950s. Cantonese opera became the first item in Hong Kong to be inscribed onto the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009. Other well-known genres, including kunqu and Beijing opera, were also inscribed onto this list in 2001 and 2010 respectively. In recent years, the number of Cantonese opera performances and operatic song concerts taking place in Hong Kong has increased to over one thousand per year. Attendance figures rank the highest among the four major types of performing arts (theatre, music, dance and xiqu).

About Xiqu Centre
As well as providing Hong Kong with both a world-class arts venue specifically built for xiqu performances, and a centre for production, education and research, the Xiqu Centre will help preserve and reinvent Cantonese opera and other Chinese traditional theatre for local and international audiences. The Xiqu Centre will act as the eastern gateway to the district and is due to open in 2018.