19.03.2025 / 7:30pm Grand Theatre, Hong Kong Cultural Centre
Approximately one hour and 40 minutes with no interval
Performed
House Rules
※ Please switch off mobile phones and all electronic devices so they will not emit sound or light during the performance, disturbing the performers and other audience members.
※ Unauthorised photography or recording of any kind is strictly prohibited.
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※ The content of all works is independently produced by the creative team, and does not reflect the views or opinions of the Sponsor.
※ The content of this programme and the opinions featured in this publication are solely those of the artists/guest writers and do not represent the views or opinions of the Hong Kong Arts Festival (“HKAF”).
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※ The HKAF also reserves the sole discretion to determine the possibility of admission and re-admission of audience members (which includes latecomers and audience members who have left the auditorium and are seeking re-admission), as well as the manner in which they are admitted.
※ In any case, should the HKAF permit the admission of latecomers, such latecomers shall only be admitted at designated latecomer point(s). No refunds or changes will be offered if ticket holders are refused admission due to late arrival. In the event of any dispute, the HKAF reserves all rights to make the final decision.
※ The English versions of the house rules on the HKAF website and front-of-house announcements will prevail in the event of any dispute.
Artist Sharing Session
Virtuosic vocalists’ dazzling journey through contemporary music
17.03.2025 (Past event)
Pre-Performance Talk
Amopera—Reinventing Music Theatre in a Spectacle of Love
19.03.2025 (Past event)
Contents
Chief Executive’s Message
Chairman’s Message
Foreword
Note from Klangforum Wien’s
Artistic Director
About Amopera Programme Programme Notes
Feature Article
Creative, Production Team and Performers
About Klangforum Wien
About Needcompany
Creators’ and Performers’ Profiles
Musicians
About the Hong Kong Arts Festival
Committee and Staff List
Acknowledgements
Message
I am pleased to congratulate the Hong Kong Arts Festival on the organisation of its 2025 season—the 53rd edition of one of the world’s most celebrated international cultural events.
This year’s Festival brings together over 1,300 international and local artists in some 125 performances covering music, dance, theatre, Chinese and Western opera and much more. The Festival-opening performance, by Italy’s Orchestra of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, conducted by Maestro Donato Renzetti, features classic Italian opera arias. Renowned Chinese conductor Lü Jia and the China National Centre for the Performing Arts Orchestra, together with international pianist Zhang Haochen and soprano Song Yuanming, bring the Festival to a close in grand style.
Festival PLUS returns, presenting a wealth of artist-audience events, including masterclasses and workshops, backstage visits, guided cultural tours and more. Besides, the Festival’s “Young Friends” programme features school tours, pre-performance talks, arts demonstrations and other special events designed to engage local young people with a world of arts and culture.
The Government is determined to enhance the appeal of Hong Kong’s culture. To further solidify Hong Kong’s position as a vibrant Eastmeets-West centre for international cultural exchanges, the Government has launched the Blueprint for Arts and Culture and Creative Industries Development in November 2024, and has been actively working on the 71 measures under four key strategic directions as outlined in the Blueprint.
I am grateful to the Hong Kong Arts Festival and its dedicated team for their unremitting efforts in promoting arts and culture in Hong Kong, throughout the region and around the world. I am grateful, too, to the many sponsors and donors for their generous support for the Festival.
I wish this year’s Hong Kong Arts Festival another resplendent season of arts and culture, entertainment and memorable community engagement.
John KC LEE Chief Executive Hong Kong Special Administrative Region
Chairman’s Message
A warm welcome to the 53rd Hong Kong Arts Festival. As a leading international performing arts event, the Festival is continuing its mission of enhancing Hong Kong’s cultural landscape by showcasing over 1,300 exceptional international and local artists in more than 125 performances of over 45 unique programmes, as well as organising about 300 PLUS and educational activities for the community.
I would like to thank the HKSAR Government, acting through the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, for its annual subvention and matching grant which are not only essential to our operations, but also an important recognition of the work we do. I also want to thank The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust for its unwavering support during the past 53 years, as well as other corporate sponsors, charitable foundations and donors, whose contributions have enabled us to reach out to different sectors of the community and positively impact society through the performing arts.
My deepest gratitude goes to all participating artists for their dedication and exceptional performances. I also thank all HKAF staff, who worked extremely hard to bring this Festival to life.
Most importantly, I extend my heartfelt appreciation to all audience members for your participation and support. May you find joy and inspiration in our programmes and events.
Lo Kingman Chairman Hong Kong Arts Festival
Supporting Organisation:
Promoting international cultural exchange has always been a key objective of the Hong Kong Arts Festival. This year’s Festival continues to invite renowned global masters and internationally recognised young pioneers to present a range of worldclass programmes, respecting tradition while encouraging new, innovative initiatives. Many of these works are inspired by classic literature or offer rediscoveries of the original, bringing vibrant artistic experiences to the city.
We will also present a series of programmes centred around “fantasy and adventure”. These include works that seamlessly blend the arts with VR and AR technology, as well as captivating new creations that draw on traditional puppetry and circus performances. The Festival will also continue to support local artists and encourage exchanges to foster a vibrant and diversified platform for the arts.
We also remain dedicated to advancing arts education and audience building. Our PLUS programmes will present a series of thoughtfully curated masterclasses, backstage visits, post-performance artist talks and an exhibition. And our Young Friends and educational activities will continue to offer multidimensional arts experiences to students.
We hope that you will enjoy this year’s arts extravaganza prepared by the Hong Kong Arts Festival team.
Flora Yu Executive Director Hong Kong Arts Festival
The Hong Kong Arts Festival is made possible with the funding support of:
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Note from Klangforum Wien’s Artistic
Director
Amopera exemplifies a creative process which goes beyond the efforts of any individual composer. The entire ensemble immersed itself in more than 90 operas written during the past 110 years. Both the autonomy and inviolability of any self-contained work of art remained beyond dispute, but we gained completely surprising perspectives once we transcended its plot in search of connections.
From an inner perspective, by way of listening, many people of different languages and attitudes tried to make out the deeper meaning of a musical message and compiled a single vast tableau. In collaboration with Needcompany from Belgium, Klangforum Wien traverses the searing hot and yet forbidding terrain of love between hopelessness and ecstasy.
Amopera takes the audience on a journey through what is new in music and opera. By way of montage, adaptation and concentration, excerpts from various works and different decades were assembled in order to re-activate their potential—in the form of a meta-opera. Colourful, entertaining and profound, it represents a history of opera literature with a focus on what is new; shameless— and full of surprises.
It is music in particular which time and again calls to mind the human potential to creatively deal with the most diverse phenomena and dimensions of time. Not least the kind of music that was written years, decades or even centuries ago, preserved in the form of scores that, by means of current realisations, makes it possible to bring them into the present day, into a completely fresh context.
This is also the case in Amopera—a metaopera which is the result of a “radical cooperation” between Jan Lauwers, Belgian Needcompany, with Grace Tjang and Maarten Seghers, and Klangforum Wien.
It compiles fragments from the operatic history of the past 100 years to form a completely new work lasting about 90 minutes. The selected fragments are not just taken from operas: Amopera amalgamates heterogeneous material such as arias, songs, passages from monodrama and some more experimental combinations of musical instruments, with the human voice.
The title Amopera refers to two central ideas, as Seghers points out: “Amor opera. I am opera.” On the one hand, it is about love—a common thread that has obviously been running through operatic history not just since the 20th century.
It was inspired by a source depicting things—not as seen through the proverbial rose-coloured glasses, but exploring the dark sides of love: Liebesverrat (“Betrayed Love”) is the title of Peter von Matt’s book portraying the “perfidious characters in literature”. According to him, it addresses the three de facto main topics in literary history: weddings, death and madness— which, for the author, is interchangeable with suicide.
In this conceptual field we can locate the opera libretti that form part of Amopera: one need only think of such plots as Salvatore Sciarrino’s Luci mie traditrici (1996-98), which tells the story of the madrigal composer Carlo Gesualdo, who allegedly murdered his wife, Maria d’Avalos, and her lover.
On the other hand, the title implies a kind of self-empowerment: “I am opera.” The protagonists are no longer Cassandra, Lulu or Mr Punch, but the singers Holger Falk and Sarah Maria Sun, as well as the musicians of Klangforum Wien in all their various, never entirely settled identities and material presence on stage.
Instead of hiding the musicians in the orchestra pit, out of the audience’s sight, they are exposed on stage, becoming an integral part of the action. In this sense, Amopera can be understood as a metaopera—an opera in particular about those who “make” opera happen.
arr. Andreas Lindenbaum (2022) “Szene 8” from La bianca notte (2013-15)
Sara Glojnarić (b. 1991)
Artefacts #2 (2019)
Iannis Xenakis (1922-2001)
Excerpt from Kassandra (1987)
Luciano Berio (1925-2003)
Excerpt I from Recital I (For Cathy) (1972)
Peter Maxwell Davies (1934-2016) “No. 5 The Phantom Queen” from Eight Songs for a Mad King (1969)
Luciano Berio (1925-2003)
Excerpt II from Recital I (For Cathy) (1972)
Harrison Birtwistle (1934-2022) “Love Duet” from Punch and Judy (1968)
Michael Wertmüller (b. 1966)
arr. Michael Wertmüller (2022) “Blow My Blues Away” from Diodati. Unendlich (2018)
Rebecca Saunders (b. 1967) Excerpt from O Yes & I (2017-18)
Peter Maxwell Davies (1934-2016) “No. 3 The Lady-in-Waiting” from Eight Songs for a Mad King (1969)
Bernhard Lang (b. 1957) arr. Bernhard Lang (2022) “Ach, ich fühl’s” from I Hate Mozart (2005)
Alexander Zemlinsky (1871-1942) “Sag’, daß es nicht wahr ist” from Der Zwerg (1922)
Alban Berg (1885-1935) arr. Eberhard Kloke (2008) “Das war ein Stück Arbeit” from Lulu (1935)
Salvatore Sciarrino arr. Salvatore Sciarrino (2022) “Moro, lasso” from Le Voci Sottovetro (1999)
Benjamin Britten (1913-76)
“She sleeps as a rose upon the night” from The Rape of Lucretia (1946)
Feature Article
The Creative Minds of Amopera
Editor’s Note: The content of this conversation was originally published in the 2022 house programme of Amopera and edited by the HKAF editorial team. The original interview was conducted in Vienna on 30 September 2022.
Jakob Schermann (Interviewer)
Jan Lauwers (Director of Amopera)
Grace Tjang (Scenographer, Performer and Costume Designer of Amopera)
Maarten Seghers (Performer and Dramaturge of Amopera)
Both Needcompany and Klangforum Wien are in a certain way specialised collectives in their respective fields, but both are always eager to transcend their own metièr and be open to various other forms of art. How did the idea come up to work together on this meta-opera?
It came from a simple question from Klangforum. The company knew our work and had seen our work, and wanted to work with us. And then there was this idea of digging deep into the operas of the 20th century.
If Needcompany makes performing art, more or less everything is at the service of this final intention. [But] Klangforum wants to be challenged in a different way beyond its musicality and instrumental skills. So I think that’s clearly a field where we do have a different tradition of creating art.
I think that terms like gesture, movement and space are as important in music as they are in dance and any other performing art. So how does it specifically feel for Needcompany to work with musicians as performers?
I can give you an example. We have Paul Blackman, who is a choreographer of the work I do with opera. He warms up and trains the musicians, and he was impressed by the approach of these musicians, who were not trained dancers, and by how strong they were. We don’t have the pretention to say: “We will now present a kaleidoscope of the operas of the 20th century.” We are not doing the highlights of the operas, because there’s no Ligeti, there’s no Nono.
We use material from the operas to tell a new story, and the story is about Klangforum. And that was also a surprise for us, because every performance dictates its own story and also its own energy.
The central topic of Amopera is love, as the title suggests, and love is often described as a feeling, or a state of mind, that is “beyond words”. How do you approach these texts in terms of meaning and poetry?
My approach is different than that of Grace and Maarten. Maarten is more focused on the music, and Grace on the scenography and totality. I’m more focused on how I can, for example, help [the singers] Holger and Sarah survive with all that material. What is my tool, what is my focus as a director?
Klangforum Wien, a leading ensemble for contemporary music, is celebrated for its open-mindedness, virtuosity and a keen ear for innovation. Founded by Beat Furrer in 1985, this diverse group of 25 musicians from 13 countries has had a significant impact on music history, with around 600 world premieres and more than 90 recordings to its name.
Performing at prestigious venues and major festivals, Klangforum Wien hosts an annual concert series at the Wiener Konzerthaus and has maintained a collective professorship at the University of Music and Graz Performing Arts since 2009. Its thoughtful repertoire choices and profound understanding of each composition enhance the ensemble's joyful and exceptional performances, continuously pushing the boundaries of artistic creativity.
About Needcompany
Needcompany is an artists' company founded by artists Jan Lauwers and Grace Tjang in 1986. Together with artist Maarten Seghers, they represent the core of the company, which encompasses a wide range of artistic endeavours, including theatre, dance, performance, visual arts and writing. Their creations have been showcased at prominent venues both domestically and internationally. Since 2023, Lauwers and Tjang have been sharing the artistic direction of Needcompany.
From its inception, Needcompany has identified itself as an international, multilingual, innovative and multidisciplinary enterprise. The company focuses on the individual artist, placing significant emphasis on authorship. All projects are grounded in authenticity and meaning, continually questioning the medium itself and examining the relationship between the content and its form. Needcompany values quality, collaboration and innovation, establishing itself as a leading voice in the social discourse surrounding the necessity and beauty of art both at home and abroad.
Creators’ and Performers’ Profiles
Musicians Klangforum Wien
Flute
Vera Fischer
Wendy Vo Cong Tri
Oboe
Markus Deuter
Clarinet
Bernhard Zachhuber
Hugo Queirós
Bassoon
Lorelei Dowling
Saxophone
Gerald Preinfalk
Horn
Christoph Walder
Trumpet
Anders Nyqvist
Trombone
Ivo Nilsson
Harp
Miriam Overlach
Percussion
Alex Lipowski
Björn Wilker
Lukas Schiske
Accordion
Krassimir Sterev
Piano
Florian Müller
Violin
Annette Bik
Sophie Schafleitner
Gunde Jäch-Micko
Viola
Dimitrios Polisoidis
Cello
Benedikt Leitner
Andreas Lindenbaum
Double Bass
Evan Hubert
About the Hong Kong Arts Festival
Launched in 1973, the Hong Kong Arts Festival is a major international arts festival committed to enriching the cultural life of the city. In February and March every year, the Festival presents leading local and international artists in all genres of the performing arts, placing equal importance on great traditions and contemporary creations. The Festival also commissions and produces work in Cantonese opera, theatre, music, chamber opera and contemporary dance by Hong Kong’s creative talent and emerging artists; many of these works have had successful subsequent runs in Hong Kong and overseas. The Festival also presents “PLUS” and educational activities that bring a diverse range of arts experiences to the community as well as tertiary, secondary and primary school students. In addition, through the “No Limits” project co-presented with The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, the Festival strives to create an inclusive space for people with different abilities to share the joys of the arts together.
The HKAF is a non-profit organisation. The total estimated income for FY2024/25 (including the 53rd Hong Kong Arts Festival and 2025 “No Limits”) is approximately HK$150 million. Current Government annual baseline funding accounts for around 12% of the Festival's total income. Around 23% of the Festival’s income needs to come from the box office, and around 45% from sponsorship and donations made by corporations, individuals and charitable foundations. The remaining 20% is expected to come from other revenue sources including the Government’s matching grant scheme, which matches income generated through private sector sponsorship and donations.
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*Contract Staff In alphabetical order # 2023/24 and 2024/25 The Arts Talents Internship Matching Programme is supported by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council Updated February 2025
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