Month-long piano festival to be held in Pudong
Jacqueline Tang, a pianist and professor with Shanghai Conservatory of Music, performs at the press conference of the International Piano Festival.
Dozens of the world's famous musicians will take part in a piano festival and composing competition in Pudong's Chuansha Town in August 2018.
Sixteen piano masters from China, the United States, Russia, Italy, France and other nations will present 10 concerts at major theaters in Pudong during the month-long festival. They include the Chuansha Cinema and Shanghai Oriental Arts Center. Concerts will also be held at the Shanghai Disney Resort and the historic town of Chuansha.
As a highlight, an international composing competition will invite composers and musicians from famous music institutes around the world to create piano pieces with a Chinese flavor, the organizer said.
"The festival aims to become an exchange platform for the world's top piano artists and an opportunity to find outstanding Chinese piano works," said Zhou Ken, a famous pianist and art director of the festival.
The competition, the first of its kind in the city, is named after Huang Zi (1904-1938), a Chinese composer who created the first Chinese symphonic piece of music in the 1920s, and one of the founders of Shanghai Conservatory of Music. Huang was a native of Chuansha Town.
Nine senior composers from a number of countries will join the judging panel to select the best song from the competition. The total prize pool is worth US$55,000, and the winning works will be made into CDs and sold around the world.
The festival and competition will be broadcast live and expected to attract an audience of over 3 million music enthusiasts from around the world, Zhou said.
