From our reporter, Rudolph Tang:
Peking University (PKU) announced today a plan to build an opera house on its campus that seats 1,000 people, as well as a concert hall seats 200 people. The construction site, cleared last year, covers an area of 10,651 square metres with the gross floor area reaching an astounding 16,000 square metres.
Construction will begin by the end of this year and is expected for completion in 2015. It will be the second venue in Beijing exclusive for operas, after the opera house at the National Centre for the Performing Arts, and the fourth in China. It is expected that the Opera Centre of PKU will be the resident opera company of the new opera house. No information on acoustic design has been given.
Here is the design rendering:
I got so scared! I adore the relatively new Paul Andreu building (yes, the locally detested “Egg”) and I was afraid of something similar to the Paul Andreu Paris terminal incident. Thank God it was not the case! How unlucky can an architect get after all?!…
People should perhaps be reminded that Chinese Opera has nothing to do with what we generally mean when we talk about “opera” from, say, Pergolesi’s Serva Padrona to, say, John Corigliano’s Ghosts of Versailles! lol
Interstingly, Pergolesi’s Serva Padrona has been staged several times in China, FYI.
Saddened to recall the American product of frozen TV dinner in the trademark of Chungking for so-called Chinese food!! A mirror of similar historic alienation!
Great news!
All they need now are elections, basic human rights and a free press.
and clean air please.
Support! Hope this brings more beautiful concerts/operas to Beijing.
Who is the design architect for this project?
Don’t know yet.
Concert hall for 200 and an opera house for 1,000? Are you sure, Norman? The seats will be a very long way apart.
These are completely suitable numbers for university venues. I imagine the concert hall is intended for chamber concerts and, as stated, the opera house is for student productions. An opera house designed for 1000 would be perfect for 17th and 18th century works, provided the stage is large enough and well-enough equipped. I wish success to the architect and, especially, the acoustician..
–Sixtus. ..
Is this really a new worthy item to take place on this blog? As far as this reader is concerned, adding a couple of more concert venues, notably small ones, in a city that has pretty much eliminated all forms of organic life that produce oxygen naturally is not big deal to report, for both artistic and architectural reasons.