Thoughts on Hong Kong 6

Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra/Sinfonietta

For the most part I can echo everyone else's sentiments on these two ensembles and their performances. I enjoyed both, but musically I thought the Chinese Orchestra played with more passion and energy. The Mendelson concert I felt was technically good, but was lacking in depth or emotion. Not knowing much about Mendelson beforehand, I did like finding out about his history and his influences, though some of the presentation (such as the actress who recited the excerpt from "A Midsummer's Night Dream") didn't mesh well with the orchestra's performance. It all came out a bit jumbled and detracted from the music itself.

The only thing I would have changed about attending the Chinese Orchestra rehearsal was getting a more comprehensive lecture on the instruments themselves. All the instruments in the orchestra were foreign to me and I would have liked to know more about them. The erhu was discussed briefly, but there were many other instruments like the ones in the back that I couldn't get a clear view of, that looked very interesting. I'm thinking of what looked like a cluster of miniature organ pipes all banded together and played through a French Horn-type mouth piece. (I bought a dvd of the orchestra, so it shows some close ups of the musicians playing these intruments, but you can't always tell how the instrument is played.) We did get literature that had an introduction to all the instuments, but unfortunately it was in Cantonese so I wasn't able to read it.