Sir Simon Rattle: ‘more people in mainland China are learning the piano than the population of Germany’
- British music director of London Symphony Orchestra will conduct orchestra in Hong Kong to help celebrate Hong Kong Cultural Centre’s 30th anniversary
Asia offers great potential for the growth of classical music, says Sir Simon Rattle, the British conductor and music director of one of the world’s most prestigious orchestras, the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO).
Rattle will be bringing the LSO to Hong Kong for three spellbinding evenings in September to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre.
I believe there are more people in mainland China learning the piano than the population of Germany. If I was an investing man, I would put my money into Chinese pianos at the moment
Accompanying the orchestra on September 25 will be piano maestro Emanuel Ax, who will play Brahms’ fiendishly difficult Piano Concerto No 2 in B-flat, Op 83.
Two talented Hong Kong-born pianists will perform with the orchestra on the other two dates. Colleen Lee will play Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No 3 in C major, Op 26 on September 22 and Aristo Sham will play Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No 3 in D minor, Op 30 on September 24.
Rattle says that it is not only important for British classical musicians to go to Asia, but it is also very inspiring.
“Living in a country in which the arts are marginalised – and we wonder who is taking care of them – when we then go to Asia and see excitement and passion for music, this is something palpable and deeply moving for us,” he says.
