The Kinmen Tunnel Music Festival, now in its 14th year, kicked off Saturday in the offshore county with the theme “War and Peace,” which the organizers said was aimed at conveying the Taiwanese people’s longing for peace.
This year’s festival opened with classical music performances that included Tchaikovsky’s Andante Cantabile, and two Peking opera pieces, which were sang by Chu Lu-hao (朱陸豪).
Cellist Chang Chen-chieh (張正傑), the festival’s music director, said the two pieces Chu sang — “Empty Fort Strategy” and “Song of Gaixia” — were selected to convey the Taiwanese people’s longing for peace, as they were from plays that featured historical battles.
Best known for his vivid portrayal of the Monkey King in the play “Journey to the West,” Chu was performing for the second time at the annual festival, which is being held for the 14th year in Kinmen’s Zhaishan Tunnel.
During his first performance at the festival six years ago, Chu also sang “Song of Gaixia” from the Peking opera “Farewell my Concubine,” but this time he became so emotional that he burst into tears when the song ended, he said.
Some attendees at the festival also felt it was a moving experience, and a woman surnamed Shen (沈) said the music seemed to have softened the edges of the tunnel, which was once a military facility.
Krzysztof Pfaff, 44, said listening to a concert in a former military outpost resonated deeply with him, partly because his home country Poland has a history of war.
On Sunday, pipa player Chen Chia-jung (陳佳容) is slated to perform “Ambush from all Sides,” a musical narrative of the Battle of Gaixia, which pays tribute to Chinese General Xiang Yu (項羽) who died during that fight in 202 BC.
Zhaishan Tunnel was excavated in 1963 by the Kinmen Defense Command in the wake of the 823 Artillery Bombardment — an attack by China on Kinmen that began on Aug. 23, 1958, during which the island county was bombarded with some 470,000 artillery shells.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel