The China Orchestra Festival is a grand event created by the NCPA for Chinese audiences. From April 4^th to 30^th, the 9^th China Orchestra Festival will present 26 concerts over the course of a month, showcasing the brilliance of Chinese symphonic music.

The year 2025 marks the 120^th anniversary of Chinese cinema. A series of special performances will thus be put on under the title of “Homage to the 120^th Anniversary of Chinese Cinema”. Three accomplished orchestras will come on invitation and give seven concerts at the Beijing Performing Arts Centre - they are the China Film Symphony Orchestra, a leading Chinese film studio orchestra, the Orchestra of Changchun Film Studio, affiliated to the first film studio to be founded by the P.R.C., and the Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra, which comes from the Greater Bay Area, where it records film music for the Pearl River Film Studio.


2025 marks the 120^th anniversary of Chinese cinema, and the 9^th China Orchestra Festival has specially curated a "Tribute to 120 Years of Chinese Film" concert series. This milestone programme brings together three outstanding orchestras—the China Film Orchestra (the nation’s leading film music ensemble), the Changchun Film Studio (rooted in China’s first film studio), and the Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra (affiliated with Guangdong’s Pearl River Film Studio in Greater Bay Area)—for seven exclusive performances at the Beijing Arts Centre.

Each orchestra will showcase its distinctive artistry, tracing a century of cinematic music glory—from Dingjun Mountain (1905, China’s first film) to Ne Zha: The Devil’s Fury (2025, a global box-office top-five contender). This series not only pioneers new artistic formats for the festival but also offers a heartfelt retrospective of Chinese film music’s evolution.


On April 12^th and 13^th, the China Film Symphony Orchestra will appear on the stage ahead of the other two and give an audiovisual symphony concert, where the audience will be taken through through the century-old silver screen to enjoy hit songs of the times. As one of the P.R.C.’s oldest national symphony orchestras, the China Film Symphony Orchestra will mainly present early classic Chinese film music this time. Their repertoire features an ingenious fusion of profound history and musical masterpieces. In particular, they will give a rendition of rearranged music from Dingjun Mountain in homage to China’s first film Dingjun Mountain (1905), and also give an interpretation of “The White-Haired Girl Suite” from China’s first opera The White-Haired Girl. Besides, they will perform masterpieces by REN Guang, HE Lüting, MA Ke, LIU Chi, Lücheng Zheng, WANG Ming and other well-known composers. From China’s earliest extant silent feature film Labourer’s Love to Song of the Fishermen, Angels on the Road and Crossroads, three films of the Republican style, from Honghu Lake Capriccio, a red epic, to Velvet Flowers and Sunny Last Nine Days of the Year, two songs in poetic bloom, from hit songs of the times, such as Ode to Yanan and My Mother, to symphonic collisions in Hunting Tiger, and from the struggle horn in Entrepreneurial Suite to the romantic poem in Girls Under the Sea, every note is an echo of the times, and every melody is a historical testimony to the Chinese film culture.

Beyond that, the Orchestra will hold a concert of anime music, entitled “Childhood Projector”, at the Open-air Theatre of the Beijing Performing Arts Centre on the afternoon of April 12^th. Under XIAO Chao’s passionate baton, the music from China’s classic cartoons, such as The Snow Child, The Three Monks, Prince Nezha’s Triumph Against Dragon King, Shuke and Beita and Calabash Brothers, will jog the audience’s memory of their childhood, especially of those familiar stories and pictures.

Hong Kong film music reached a new height of development in the 1980s and 1990s. During this period, excellent film music and composers emerged in an endless stream, with their musical achievements once setting the trend for the development of popular music in China. Under the “Homage to the 120^th Anniversary of Chinese Cinema”, young conductor ZHANG Zhen will raise his baton over the Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra to present an audiovisual concert of “classic” Hong Kong film music.


ZHANG Zhen, Principal Conductor and Music Director of the Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra, says that film music is what the Orchestra is adept at playing! According to him, as a top music ensemble from the Greater Bay Area, the Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra will show its “virtuosity” in symphonic music on a big screen at the Concert Hall of the Beijing Performing Arts Centre on April 20^th.

The concert will begin with “musical genius” James J.S. Wong’s Laughter in the Sea. From the chivalrous spirit in The Legendary Swordsman to the touching yet tragic love composed for The Rouge by Michael Lai, the Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra will take you back to the heyday of swordplay film and literary film in Hong Kong. Johnny Chen’s Bury the Heart, written for RUAN Lingyu, boasts melodious string music that, however, implies how miserable a fate women have in that era. Albert Leung’s Shallow in Love, written for ZHONG Wuyan, is suggestive of an ambivalent attitude and faithfulness to love. These will be followed by a ray of “white moonlight” hidden in the hearts of a certain generation - pure adoration in A Chinese Ghost Story and ultimate romance in Love in a Life Time, theme music of A Chinese Odyssey. In their repertoire are musical compositions by James J.S. Wong, Michael Lai, Joseph Koo, Albert Leung, Lowell Lo and other composers who played a decisive role in the film history of Hong Kong, ones that pushed Hong Kong’s film music into its heyday with “each piece counting as a classic”. Having long been beyond cinematography itself, these classics are now symbols of Hong Kong’s film culture. They are even emotionally comforting to many people as eternal echoes that will never be forgotten by a certain generation of film fans.

Founded in 1947, the Orchestra of Changchun Film Studio is one of the oldest and most influential national symphony orchestras of the P.R.C. It has recorded music for a total of more than 700 film and TV works, written a large number of popular film songs, and given birth to many outstanding musicians, earning itself an important position in the history of Chinese film music. In addition to holding a concert at the NCPA Concert Hall on the night of April 24^th, the Orchestra will put on several virtuoso performances on 26^th and 27^th at the Concert Hall and Open-air Theatre of the Beijing Performing Arts Centre under FAN Tao’s baton. That is, they will take the stage for four times on four days, in all sincerity.

High-quality contemporary film music will mostly be presented at the audiovisual symphony concerts held on 26^th and 27^th to offer an immersive feast of sounds and pictures. The concerts also feature music, including theme music, from ideologically sound, excellent films released in recent years, such as Youth, Sniper, Lighting Up The Stars and Ne Zha 2. Orchestral music Battle of Chosin Reservoir Suite will present moving and tragic scenes of righteous ardour on the snowy battlefield, Daylily Flower will eulogise mother-daughter ties in string music, A Love Before Time will render a touching tragic swan song with Jen Yu jumping at a bound… It is worth mentioning that the Orchestra will share the stage with ZHOU Xiaolin, CAO Fujia, JIN Shengquan, WANG Kai and other accomplished singers whom they invite.

Symphony lights up the cinematic epic while musical notes arouse the feeling of gratitude and resentment in Chinese swordplay films. On the afternoon of 26^th, the Orchestra of Changchun Film Studio will play classic Chinese swordplay film music at the Open-air Theatre of the Beijing Performing Arts Centre, including Laughter in the Sea, The Sword Like a Dream, Hard-to-Chant Scriptures and Iron-willed and Loyal-hearted. Sounding like swords glinting before the eye, these melodies will visualise one chivalrous dream or love story full of blood and tears or joys and sorrows after another.

 

Every film song is a testimony to a certain period of history. The 120^th anniversary of Chinese cinema is not only a historical milestone, but also a salute to the glorious history of Chinese film art. Taking film music as a bridge, we will not only see the charm of music, but also inherit and sublimate the spirit of Chinese cinema. Let’s recall the past days together and let every film song resound forever with the development of the times. The Ninth Chinese Orchestra Spring will soon kick off in homage to the 120^th anniversary of Chinese cinema. By then, the China Film Symphony Orchestra, Pearl River Film Studio Orchestra and Orchestra of Changchun Film Studio will join hands with the audience to perpetuate the century-old Chinese cinema and sing the praises of the times!