Concert by the Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra (China)

The Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra was founded in 1998. The founder of the orchestra was Cai Wanghuai, former Chairman of the Xiamen People’s Political Consultative Conference and currently the ensemble’s Honorary President. The Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra became the first private symphony orchestra to exist without the support of State-run institutions. The Chairman of the Board is Pan Shijian, the former Deputy Mayor of Xiamen. The current Artistic Director of the orchestra is the renowned Chinese conductor Zheng Xiaoying. The orchestra regularly performs concert premieres on the island of Gulangyu in addition to the Weekend Symphonies concert series. Over the past fourteen seasons four hundred and eighty musicians have appeared with the Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra. The orchestra has toured to France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Japan, Canada, the USA, Hong Kong and Taiwan among other countries, performing works from the Chinese and international repertoires. The ensemble has given over a thousand highly acclaimed concerts.
The orchestra also sees one of its tasks to be to raise the level of culture among young people; each year, on the initiative of Zheng Xiaoying, it performs ten free concerts for school pupils and students in Xiamen. The orchestra’s concerts are educational in character – each performance opens with an introduction explaining the concert programme.
The Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra has won numerous awards and grants from the authorities in the province of Fujian and the Xiamen City Government. In 2006, on the initiative of the city’s residents, the Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra was awarded the honorary title of “The City’s Golden Calling-Card” as an exemplary symphony ensemble; in 2008 the orchestra became known as one of the finest organisations involved in promoting cultural awareness during the thirty-year period of reform in Xiamen; in 2009 the orchestra became the only music ensemble in China to receive the honorary title of an “All-China Leading Public Organisation” from the Ministry of Civil Administration of the People’s Republic of China.
In 2011 the Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra and students of the Xiamen Polytechnic Institute staged the operas La traviata and Don Pasquale as well as the Chinese national opera Wisteria Flower. The Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra has begun to perform European and Chinese opera for the first time in the province of Fujian.