NEW YORK, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) -- The U.S.-China Music Institute of the Bard College Conservatory of Music announced that the second edition of the China Now Music Festival will be held from Sept. 25 to Oct. 6.
Featuring a series of events on both U.S. east and west coasts, the music festival will demonstrate the cultural connections between the world's two largest economies.
Themed "China and America-Unity in Music," the festival also celebrates the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, according to a press conference on Thursday held in the Museum of Chinese in America located in Manhattan's Chinatown.
Cai Jindong, director of the U.S.-China Music Institute of Bard and the artistic director of the festival, unveiled an exciting schedule of the 12-day festival, with From the Middle Kingdom to the Wild West, an orchestral concert, as the highlight to be performed at Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage at Carnegie Hall on Oct. 1.
The concert will see the world premiere of Men of Iron and the Golden Spike, a symphonic oratorio by Chinese American composer Zhou Long, honoring the over 20,000 Chinese workers who contributed to the completion of the transcontinental railroad in the United States 150 years ago.
Zhou's new concerto for orchestra, Classic of Mountain and Seas, will also have its U.S. premiere on Oct. 1 at Carnegie.
Another major concert, Wellington Koo the Diplomat -- A Life in Song, will be held on Sept. 30 in Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall, which includes a multimedia event featuring performances by Chinese artists with video projections, dramatic narration, and music.
Other events of the festival, including the Martial Arts Trilogy, created and conducted by world-renowned Chinese musician Tan Dun, will also be performed at various locations in New York and at Bard College.
The festival coincides with the newly-created China Day and Chinese American Heritage Week in New York State, which were announced in June by the state Senate Resolution No. J2103. The resolution recognized Oct. 1, 2019 as China Day and the first week of October 2019 as the Chinese American Heritage Week.
It is viewed as a move to strengthen the friendship and relations between the state of New York and Chinese Americans.
"With the China Now Music Festival as our looking glass, we hope to continue bringing people and traditions from China and America together through music," said Cai.
The Bard College Conservatory of Music is recognized as one of the finest conservatories in the United States. Founded in 2005 by cellist and philosopher Robert Martin, the conservatory welcomed Tan Dun as its new dean in the summer of 2019.
