FULL Premier Zhou Enlai (Tang Jianping) Beijing 2022
Information on the Performance
- Work Title: Premier Zhou Enlai
- Composer: Tang Jianping
- Libretto: Libretto Text, Libretto Index
- Venue & Opera Company: Beijing Tianqiao Performing Arts Centre
- Recorded: March 2, 2022
- Type: Staged Opera Live
- Singers: Wang Chuanyue. Song Yuanming, Shinbayaar
- Conductor: TAN Lihua
- Orchestra:
- Stage Director: XING Shimiao
- Costume Designer:
Information about the Recording
- Published by: Rudolph Tang
- Date Published: 2022
- Format: Unknown
- Quality Video: 3 Audio:3
- Subtitles: nosubs
- Video Recording from: YouTube FULL VIDEO
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE
Nixon in China according to TANG Jianping
How about a different narrative of Nixon in China, probably from a Chinese perspective?
Beijing-based composer TANG Jianping’s opera Premier ZHOU (2019) got its Beijing premiere in the first week of March at the Tianqiao Performing Arts Centre, a commission and production by Jiangsu Performing Arts Group. The performance was directed by XING Shimiao with TAN Lihua conducting a pickup orchestra.
The four episodes of the opera offered a biographical account of Premier ZHOU Enlai, the founding Premier of China, a wingman of MAO, and a career diplomat who set the tone for China’s international relations up till the late 1970s, including the US-China relation.
In an episode dedicated to ZHOU’s diplomatic efforts, he welcomes President Nixon and the First Lady at the airport as they disembark from Air Force One on their ice-breaking trip to China in 1972, followed by a scene of high tension taking place at ZHOU’s conference room. It ends with a solemn duet accompanied by a menacing chorus holding U.S. and Chinese flags in which President Nixon, sung by Mongolian baritone Shinbayaar, exclaimed: What a tough negotiator he is!