Program Highlight

Music inspired by legend on This Week from China’s National Centre for the Performing Arts

Classical 91.5 WXXO-FM

Published March 25, 2022 at 3:23 PM EDT

Butterfly Lovers - two graphical Asian characters in front of an orange sun with butterflies surrounding them

The Butterfly Lovers is a Chinese legend of a tragic love story of a pair of lovers, Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai, whose names form the title of the story. We'll hear the violin concerto inspired by the story on April 25th at 8pm.

4/4 LI Huanzhi: Spring Festival Overture Britten: Simple Symphony Schoenberg: Transfigured Night Wagner: Overture to Tannhäuser Prokofiev: Symphony No. 1, Classical (NCPA Orchestra; LI Xincao, LÜ Jia and YU Feng, cond)

4/11 Debussy: Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune Haydn: Symphony No. 103, Drum Roll ZHAO Cong/YIN Tianhu: Pipa and Orchestra: Flying Fairies of the Silk Road Beethoven: Choral Fantasy (ZHAO Cong, pipa; KONG Jianing, p; ZHOU Yuqian, WANG Zhihua, LIU Haiyue, LU Chuan, CAO Ruidong, LIU Dong, vocal soloists; China National Traditional Orchestra; NCPA Orchestra & Chorus; CHEN Bing and LÜ Jia, cond)

4/18 Beethoven: Egmont ZHAO Jiping: Cello Concerto, The Disillusioned Dream Debussy: La mer (SONG Yuanming, s; SUN Qiang, nar; LI-WEI Qin, c; NCPA Orchestra; LÜ Jia, cond)

4/25 J.S. Bach/SAITO Hideo: Chaconne Beethoven: Symphony No. 1 HE Zhanhao, CHEN Gang: Violin Concerto: The Butterfly Lovers YU, Julian: Concerto on Chinese Themes (ZHANG Yi; CHEN Yue, dizi; SIQING Lu, v; NCPA Orchestra; ZHANG Yi and LÜ Jia, cond)