Huayi – Chinese Festival of Arts (31 Jan – 9 Feb) is back this Chinese New Year season with a whole new range of performance and activities to celebrate the arts in a Chinese context. It was launched in 2003 as one of Singapore’s four annual cultural festivals held at Esplanade and is an annual event occurring in conjunction with Chinese New Year. This festival showcases performances from a variety of genres by outstanding Chinese artists, including theatre, dance, music, talks and storytelling. There are also visual arts activities and workshops that budding artists and the public can participate in.
Theatre
7 Sages of the Bamboo Grove (31 Jan, 1 Feb), presented by Singapore’s Toy Factory Productions, explores the relationship between art and society, as well as themes of freedom and humanity.
The Long Goodbye (7-9 Feb), presented by Taiwan’s Story Works, tells an emotional story about familial love. It features a father who has dementia and his family that he struggles to remember.
Principle (31 Jan – 2 Feb), presented by the Hong Kong Repertory Theatre, reflects education in modern society as a high school experiences two opposing systems of rule, which come into conflict with each other.
Prism of Truth (31 Jan – 5 Feb) is a local production by home-grown director Zelda Tatiana Ng. It is a mixed-media, interactive production, in which the audience participates in uncovering the mystery.
Dance
About 55 (7 – 9 Feb) is a full-length, autobiographical solo expressed entirely through dance about Qiao Yang, one of Hong Kong’s most distinguished dance artists. In her dance performance, she will reflect on her life purpose in her 50s.
Music
Huayi U Sing (9 Feb) is a live singing competition, in which contestants will compete for prizes prepared by Esplanade. Winners will be determined by live audience voting and a panel of judges.
Accomplished Mandopop singer David Tao will perform his greatest hits at DT in Harmony (1 Feb). His opening act will be Singaporean pop-duo The Freshman.
The We are Singer-songwriters! series (2 Feb) will allow audiences to connect with local Chinese up-and-coming artists in multiple intimate showcases as they perform original and cover songs, at no cost. The lineup includes: Sherman Zhuo, See Kai Zheng, Shelby Wang, Aly Koh, Cheryl Lee, Marcus Lee and Huang Tingzhi.
The in::music series features notable Taiwanese artists performing original compositions, such as soloists ØZI (Forbidden Paradise, 7 Feb), Eve Ai (The Names, 8 Feb), Ann Bai (Our Time, 9 Feb) and indie rock band Tizzy Bac (Sing Like You Mean It, 9 Feb).
There will also be a variety of musical performances by A Bigger Bang Percussion, Too Much Drama, Jessica Lu, Tony Yike Yang, Shanghai Pingtan Troupe, Daniel Chia, and a few local high schools (31 Jan – 9 Feb).
