Hong Kong Arts Festival has released the first details of its 2019 programme. It will be the 47th edition of the festival, which last year had a total attendance of 113,000.
In classical music the big names are Marin Alsop and Zubin Mehta, who will conduct the São Paulo Symphony and Israeli Philharmonic Orchestras respectively. In opera, Leipzig Opera and Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra perform Wagner’s Tannhäuser, while Zhou Long’s Madame White Snake is also in the programme.
For theatre, HKAF’s audience can look forward to Gangster’s of Hong Kong (Loong Man-Hong) and Always by Your Side (Roger Lee). The Nutcracker, performed by Hamburg Ballet, is the sole confirmed dance performance.
HKAF has also released the figures for its 2018 festival. 92% of all tickets were sold for 130 performances featuring 1,700 artists. The festival also ran 470 PLUS and education events, which it estimates engaged more than 300,000 people.
“But more important than these numbers are the wonderful performances that we have experienced together during this time,” said HKAF executive director Tisa Ho. “These attest to the power of great performances and reaffirm the possibility of real communication across personal and cultural differences. This experience is perhaps the most compelling argument for sustaining and enhancing support for the arts and investing in arts education.”
The next edition of HKAF runs from 18 February – 24 March, 2019.
