Excerpt of A Cantonese Opera, a treat from PCCO  

For those of us who attended the MPO concert featuring PCCO (Professional Cultural Center Orchestra) on last Thursday 30^th August, we were given a treat and a pleasant surprise. Not only were we entertained with some really melodious Chinese music, there was a folk dance and an excerpt of Cantonese Opera to boot!  

The folk dance accompanied the musical piece “Harvest Drums”. The Cantonese Opera excerpt (fairly long, 20 minutes) was the very popular “Meeting of Yeung Chung-bo and Muk Kwai-ying” from the famous opera about the Yeung/Yang family of warriors in the Sung Dynasty. The costumes of the couple were beautiful, both the acting and singing were superb! It was an enjoyable evening well spent at the Dewan Filharmonik Petronas. J 

 

Another thing worthy of a special mention: While the orchestra was playing the piece “Jasmine Flower” (which Puccini included in Turandot), a narrator walked around the musicians on stage to give brief introductions about the various instruments used in the performance. It was very educational and informative, especially for the uninitiated. For me, I now know of this newly invented Chinese musical instrument called Wen Qing (文琴). I think it is probably easier to play than a lot of other Chinese musical instruments, especially the erhu. J

 

The next MPO concert I am looking forward to is the ever popular La Traviata....this coming weekend!