Chinese Culture Festival 2025 upholds traditions while embracing innovation
Hong Kong’s Leisure and Cultural Services Department says line-up will entice younger audiences to celebrate nation’s customs and heritage
Hong Kong’s Chinese Culture Festival returns next month after last year’s successful debut which attracted nearly 900,000 visitors during the four-month event.
This year’s line-up of activities, which will also continue until September, promises much more ambitious plans in celebration of the inheritance, exchange and innovation of Chinese culture and history.
It will feature more than 280 programmes, including world-class performances, film screenings, exhibitions, as well as a rich array of specially curated events and community and school activities. About 3,000 leading artists from 13 Chinese provinces, alongside overseas artists and local talent, will showcase their work at a range of different venues across the city.
Ivy Ngai, chief manager of the Cultural Presentations Section at the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, says the success of last year’s festival led to many organisations asking to collaborate with organisers. Their participation has helped to enrich the programming this year by introducing innovative influences including absorbing contemporary elements to many classic productions, she says.
New festival theme music, which combines elements of popular tunes, contemporary orchestra and traditional Chinese melodies, was unveiled at an event publicising this year’s programmes. It was composed by award-winning musician Chris Babida, known for his work on the 2008 Beijing Olympics song, Light the Passion, Share the Dream.
The emphasis on innovation will be seen right from the opening programme, Dongpo: Life in Poems on June 13 and 14 – a dance performance which reinterprets the work and story of Su Dong-po, a Northern Song dynasty (960-1127) literary giant, by blending traditional and contemporary music, dance, poetry and painting. The production will be performed by the prestigious China Oriental Performing Arts Group and directed by Shen Wei, an internationally renowned multidisciplinary artist.
“One of our key themes this year is innovating while staying rooted in our rich cultural heritage,” Ngai says. “Hong Kong should serve as a bridge between China and the world. We must introduce fresh elements while honouring the traditional aspects that have been refined over centuries.
“If we focus solely on history, it might not connect to today’s audiences. But by weaving in innovative elements, we can engage new audiences, captivate younger generations and promote the inheritance of Chinese culture through creative transformation and development of splendid traditional heritage.”
Two other dance dramas and a theatrical performance featured at this year’s festival will also highlight the event’s innovative theme. The August shows of A Dream of Red Mansions, which are already sold out, reimagine the renowned Chinese 18th-century novel Dream of the Red Chamber, featuring a love triangle involving Jia Baoyu, Lin Daiyu, and Xue Baochai, through the modern perspective of a young and creative team of dancers from the Jiangsu Centre for the Performing Arts.
Azure After the Rain, performed by Shanghai Dance Theatre on September 26 and 27, retells the resilient story of famous Song dynasty (960-1279) poetess and essayist Li Qingzhao. The show, presenting the themes of love and loss through the protagonist’s own lyrical verses and modern dance, follows her early happy life and marriage, and the devastating death of her husband after fleeing the turmoil of civil war.
Four Generations Under One Roof, performed by the National Theatre of China, will be staged on July 4 and 5. The stage adaptation of Lao She’s classic novel depicts a traditional Beijing family’s resilience and moral struggles during the War of Resistance. It preserves the essence of traditional Chinese values while incorporating a modern-day theatrical reinterpretation and emotional depth.
The festival, just like last year’s event, will incorporate the city’s long-running Chinese Opera Festival. Now in its 13th edition, this year’s celebration of one of China’s most widely recognised performing art forms aims to entice opera lovers with the dramatic tales of the Three Kingdoms through six Chinese opera genres – Peking, Yuediao, Qinqiang, Yue, Cantonese and Kunqu – from across the country.
“The strength of the Chinese Culture Festival lies in its ability to consolidate energy from various parties, significantly aiding in the promotion, preservation and transmission of culture – which has far more impact than a single effort,” says Yuen Siu-fai, a veteran Cantonese opera performing artist, who will be directing two repertoires, Zhou Yu Thrice Humiliated and The Battle at Changbanpo on July 26 and 27.
Yuen will be joined by other Cantonese opera icons, such as Lee Lung and Wan Fai-yin, as well as Wan Yuk-yu and rising star Alan Tam Wing-lun.
Lee says: “The Battle at Changbangpo has absorbed many elements from Peking opera without straying from the foundations of Cantonese opera, while Zhou Yu Thrice Humiliated is going to present the most original Cantonese opera styles for the audience. It’s exciting to present two distinct interpretations this time.”
The China National Peking Opera Company will get the Chinese Opera Festival under way on June 20, 21 and 22, with its new historical production, Cession for Consolidation of the Song Regime. This innovative work retells the classic tales of Qian Chu, King of Wuyue (a state during China’s Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period from 907 to 960) by weaving both traditional and present-day Peking opera elements in the show.
Yuen says he is looking forward to meeting his fellow artists from across China. “There will be many different opera troupes participating,” he says. “I hope the festival fosters cultural exchanges among them. These interactions are vital for refining our understanding of various plays and roles in this creative era.”
Another of the highlights is a new “Tea Culture” series, which will feature four shows, numerous talks and exhibitions that explore the role of the city in the development of tea. The shows include the world premiere of an innovative piece titled TEA-liuzi, on June 4 and 5, created by contemporary classical music composer Tan Dun, which draws on tea-making techniques. It will be performed as a drumming “dialogue” – bridging the past and future and the East and West – by Xiangxi Tujia Women’s Daliuzi (a multi-instrument percussion-based musical form) and Hong Kong Women’s Percussion Ensemble.
Tan’s shows at the festival, which form part of his “Tan Dun-WE Festival”, will also see him team up with the Dunhuang Academy Ancient Music Consort on June 7 to restage The Vanishing Mogao Caves through ancient dance, vocal performances and mini-operas. Following its Paris world premiere, this performance will debut newly added ancient music.
Hong Kong’s festival will also include a series of activities highlighting the “City in Focus”, which this year is Xian, the capital of 13 ancient dynasties. In addition to displaying more than 100 relics, such as the Terracotta Army from the Emperor Qinshihuang’s Mausoleum Site Museum, in an exhibition titled “The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: The Great Unity – Civilisation of the Qin and Han Dynasties in Shaanxi Province”, the programme will also showcase the city’s performing arts.
A performance at the publicity event, featuring an ancient three-stringed Chinese instrument, the sanxian, played by a group of young local musicians, foreshadowed one of the festival’s most anticipated shows, Taisheng and Huayin Lao Qiang: Big Uncle, Second Uncle are All His Uncles. This concert, on August 17, combining both ancient and modern music, will feature unique instruments and the traditional singing style known as Huayin Lao Qiang, recognised as one of the first entries in the National Intangible Cultural Heritage List in 2006 and often described as “ancient Chinese rock’n’roll”.
“It’s a rare and great opportunity for residents to enjoy so many intangible cultural heritages and national-level performances in four months, and for visitors, we hope they will come back to the festival again as they can enjoy so many different amazing shows from across China all at once,” Ngai says.
Notable local talent recognised by the China National Arts Fund will perform on various stages through different arts mediums throughout the festival, such as the Cantonese Music Assembly’s “Cantonese Rhyme, Poetic Homeland – Sentiment of Chinese Music in the Greater Bay Area by Ricky Yeung Wai-kit and Sha Jingshan”.
The organisers hope the festival will attract both locals and visitors to attend programmes and experience the richness of Chinese culture.
In addition to ticketed events, the festival will offer a wide range of free public exhibitions and activities, including the “Encountering Chinese Culture” Carnival on June 22 at Sha Tin Town Hall and New Town Plaza, featuring performances and intangible cultural heritage booths.