“Der Dirigent Shao-Chia Lü ist ein Meister der Zwischentöne.” （The conductor Shao-Chia Lü is a master of nuances） ─ Süddeutsche Zeitung

“...Um so lauter der Jubel über die grandiose musikalische Einstudierung der‚ Jenufa’ unter Shao-Chia Lü” （... the outstanding interpretation of the 'Jenufa' under Shao-Chia Lü received thunderous applause from the audience） ─ Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

“In his mere 7 years at the helm, music director Shao-Chia Lü has brought the NSO to world-class status. The sound alone is a marvel—beauteous, richly rounded, perfectly balanced, at times of staggering power yet never forced or brash, the latter a quality found only to the world’s very greatest orchestras.” ─ der neue Merker

Conductor Shao-Chia Lü studied music in Taipei, later at the Indiana University in Bloomington, USA, and also at the College of Music Vienna. His training was topped off with three important first prizes at renowned international conductor competitions: Besancon (France), Pedrotti (Italy) and Kondrashin (the Netherlands).

Shao-Chia Lü took the position of General Music Director of the Koblenz Theatre (1998-2001), the Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie Koblenz (1998-2004), and the Staatsoper Hannover between (2001- 2006).

Shao-Chia Lü appears regularly as guest-conductor at several world renowned opera houses, including the Opera Australian in Sydney and Melbourne, the English National Opera, the Theatre de la Monnaie in Brussels, Den Norske Opera in Oslo, the Gothenburg Opera, the Oper Frankfurt, Staatsoper Hamburg and Stuttgart, the Deutsche Oper and Komische Oper Berlin.

Alongside his opera activities, Lü is equally at home on concert podiums. Lü has worked repeatedly with many leading European orchestras, such as the Oslo Philharmonic, the Orchestra Sinfonica di Santa Cecilia Rome, the Norwegian and Swedish Radio Orchestra, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, the SWR Stuttgart, the Rundfunksinfonieorchster Berlin, the Goteborg Sinfoniker, the Staatskapelle Weimar, the Frankfurter Museumsorchester and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam. In Asia, Lu has worked with Hong Kong, NHK, New Japan Philharmonic, Seoul Philharmonic, KBS Symphony and leading orchestras in China.

Shao-Chia Lü was Music Director of the Taiwan Philharmonic from 2010 till 2020 and the Principal Conductor of the South Denmark Philharmonic from 2014-2017. Currently, Meastro Lü is the honourary conductor of Taiwan Philharmonic.

China NCPA Orchestra is the resident orchestra of the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA), Beijing. Since its founding in 2010, the orchestra has fast established itself as one of the most adventurous and dynamic orchestras in the country and earned an international reputation through extensive performances abroad.

Artists associated with the orchestra include Zubin Mehta, Valery Gergiev, Myung-Whun Chung, Fabio Luisi, Christoph Eschenbach, Shao-Chia Lü, ZHANG Xian, Rudolf Buchbinder, Lang Lang, Stephen Kovacevich, Yuja Wang, WANG Jian, Gautier Capucon, Kyung Wha Chung, Vadim Repin, Placido Domingo, Renee Fleming, and Leo Nucci among many others. Lorin Maazel worked closely with the orchestra before his passing and praised the musicians for their “amazing professionalism and great passion in music”.

The orchestra has gained critical acclaim for its performances in NCPA’s opera productions of not only classical repertoire such as Tristan and Isolde, Der Rosenkavalier, Tosca and Aida, but also newly commissioned works like The Rickshaw Boy, The Long March, and The Jinsha River. In its own orchestral concert season, it has consistently presented creative and diverse programmes. The orchestra also gave the Chinese premieres of works by Toru Takemitsu, et al, commissioned and world premiered many works by Michael Gordon, Augusta Read Thomas, CHEN Qigang, and ZHAO Jiping et al. Their performance of The Ring without Words with its creator, Lorin Maazel, was released on SONY Classics worldwide. In 2019, the orchestra’s recording of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 was awarded "Best Orchestral Album" at the 2018 Chinese Audiophile Vinyl Award. In 2021, the NCPAO released Beethoven’s Egmont, becoming the first Chinese orchestra to record this masterpiece. In celebration of the tenth anniversary of its Music Director LÜ Jia’s ongoing tenure, the orchestra released two albums in 2022, including Bruckner's Symphony No. 9 and a selection of live recordings conducted by LÜ Jia. In July 2023, the NCPAO released the recording of Bruckner’s Symphony No. 3.

Alongside its concert series, the orchestra has received widespread praise for its international appearances at the Kissingen Summer Music Festival and the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival and concerts in many cities in Germany, as well as in Sydney, Singapore, Seoul, Daegu, Abu Dhabi, Taipei and Macau. In 2014, the orchestra undertook its first North American tour and returned in 2017, where it performed at Carnegie Hall, Chicago Symphony Center, Davies Symphony Hall and other major venues in the US and Canada, under the baton of LÜ Jia. Musical America praised its “joyful confidence and youthful strength”. Concerto Net described it as “a polished, first rate ensemble”. April 2021 saw the orchestra complete their first six-city domestic tour, which Music Weekly praised as "a series of sophisticated programs in concerts that blew the roof off,” followed by a second tour in March 2023.

China NCPA Chorus is the resident chorus of National Centre for the Performing Arts.

China NCPA Chorus was established on December 8^th, 2009. WU Lingfen, the famous conductor, serves as its chorus master. As the professional artistic performing group that belongs to the highest palace of performing arts, the chorus adheres to the NCPA's guiding principle of "for the people, for art, for the world" and is recognized as a vigorous professional chorus with infinite potential.

Since its establishment, it has participated in more than 50 operas by NCPA such as opera commissions Xishi, A Village Teacher, The Chinese Orphan, The Beautiful Blue Danube, The Ballad of Canal, Rickshaw Boy, Visitors on the Snow Mountain, Sunrise, The Dawns Here Are Quiet, FANG Zhimin, The Long March, Jinsha River, LAN Huahua and Effendi, and Chinese and foreign classic operas such as The White-Haired Girl, The Red Guards on Honghu Lake, Turandot, Carmen, La Traviata, L'Elisir d'Amore, Tosca, Die Fledermaus, Der Fliegende Holländer, Un Ballo in Maschera, Lohengrin, Les Contes d'Hoffmann, Otello, Nabucco, Le Nozze di Figaro, L'Italiana in Algeri, Il Trovatore, Cavalleria Rusticana & I Pagliacci, Norma, Don Pasquale, Aida, Rigoletto, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Eugene Onegin, Andrea Chenier, Der Rosenkavalier, Simon Boccanegra, Samson et Dalilah, La Gioconda, Tannhäuser, Macbeth, Rusalka, Lucia di Lammermoor, Tristan und Isolde, Falstaff, Thais, La Figlia del Regimento, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Romeo and Juliet, La sonnambula, Don Giovanni, La fanciulla del West, Les Pecheurs de Peries. Its artistic attainments have won favourable comments from the insiders and audiences. Apart from operas, the chorus has also planned and performed in many large-scale vocal works and theme concerts including Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, Mahler's Second, Third and Eighth Symphonies, Verdi's Requiem, and Concert to Commemorate the 110^th Anniversary of HUANG Zi's Birth, the opera concerts such as William Tell, Don Juan and many politically significant state level performances including large-scale music and dance epic Road to Rejuvenation, Victory and Peace–Evening Gala to Commemorate the 70^th Anniversary of the Victory of the World Anti-fascist War and the Counter-Japanese War of the Chinese People, Evening Gala for the G20 Hangzhou Summit, the Gala Commemorating the 80^th Anniversary of the Victory of the Long March, the gala "Millennial Road" for the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, the National Day Celebration Performance Go for the Better, The Sons and Daughters of the Chinese Nation and the opening ceremony of Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games. By means of the concerts, the chorus makes more audiences to understand more of its charm and the artistic spirit of its unremitting efforts.

The masters have given high appraisals to the chorus. The late conductor Lorin Maazel said, "It is a Chorus of passion"; conductor Daniel Oren, who was excited after rehearsal, said, "This is the chorus that has the best sound I have ever heard. Young as they are, they are better than many of the choruses in Europe"; conductor Antonio Pappano said, "This is a youthful and passionate chorus that has been well trained to sound wonderful and harmonious"; the world famous tenor Domingo once said, "I am honoured to cooperate with these gifted young artists".

As the singing envoy of zeitgeist, the chorus has always been paying attention to fostering audience, supporting and participating in the artistic education and popularization activities of NCPA. It actively plans and participates in NCPA's Weekend Concert series, Classic Art Lectures series, and appears in more than 40 public benefit events held in schools, communities, enterprises, militar camps and hospitals every year to help popularize elegant art, so as to improve people's aesthetic taste. Meanwhile, the chorus commits itself to introducing NCPA's artistic productions and outstanding classic works to audiences at home and abroad.

Beijing, in the new century, is full of the prosperous atmosphere of elegant art. The young artists of the chorus devote their most vigorous and dynamic youth to the cause of China's opera, and strive for dream and art!

The Beijing Philharmonic Choir was founded in 1983 by the famous conductor and educator YANG Hongnian, professor at the Central Conservatory of Music. YANG Li, professor at the Department of Conducting, Central Conservatory of Music, is Permanent Conductor of the Choir.

Over the past 30 years, the Choir has trained thousands of children with a passion for music, accumulating a repertoire of more than a thousand Chinese and foreign choral works, and giving about one thousand performances. It has visited many European, American and Asian countries and regions including Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. It has won more than 40 grand awards in international and domestic competitions, released 32 sets of audiovisual works including CDs and DVDs, and published seven children’s chorus albums.

The Choir conveys friendship with singing. In 1987, the Choir was invited to the Third International Children’s Chorus Festival in Washington, US, and was awarded the “Highest Appreciation Certificate” signed by Mr. Reagan, the then President of the US; In August 2008, the Choir sang the permanent Olympic anthem Olympic Hymn at the opening ceremony of the 29^th Olympic Games in Beijing; in 2017 and 2019, the Choir gave a performance twice at the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation; from 2016 to 2019, the Choir appeared at the “Ode to Peace” world tour organised by the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC), and gave performances in Palestine, Israel, Santa Claus Village Finland, North Korea and Peacekeeping Force Headquarters Lebanon to call for peace with the world.

The Choir’s artistic pursuit under high standards has enabled them to win awards in many international chorus competitions. In 1996, the Choir visited Italy to participate in the 44^th International Guido d’Arezzo Polyphonic Contest, and won four awards; in 2010, the Choir participated in the 24^th Béla Bartók International Choir Competition, Hungary, winning First Prize in the teenager group and Second Prize in the youth group; in July 2015, the Choir won Second Place in the finals and other four important awards in the 54^th International Choir Competition in Gorizia, Italy. In August 2017, the Choir went to Italy again to participate in the 65^th International Guido d’Arezzo Polyphonic Contest, and won the championship, with the National Anthem of China played for the first time on a European top chorus arena.

Adhering to the tenet of “love and dedication”, the Choir participates in charity performances and popular concerts, sharing beauty and love with their voices.