Leader: JIN Zhengjian Deputy Leader: LI Xiaojie

As a vital force for opera production at the NCPA and even for the entire Chinese opera stage, the NCPA Resident Singers, founded in October 2011, are one of the most representative and best interpreters of the opera art. Its members are all outstanding opera singers from home or abroad. They have played a pivotal role in the NCPA’s production of over 70 Chinese opera commissions and world classic operas, becoming a performing arts group that has reached the most extensive and deepest cooperation with Chinese and world-class conductors, directors, singers and stage artists, as well as prestigious theatres and art institutions. Besides, they are among the few art teams under world-class professional management.

With great expertise and high morale, the NCPA Resident Singers have given their rendition of many operas in Italian, French, German, Russian, Czech and other languages. Among these are classic masterpieces that just premiered in China, such as Der Rosenkavalier, Lohengrin, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Simon Boccanegra, La Fanciulla del West and Rusalka. Their international counterparts have offered them high praise for their great performance in the co-productions of the NCPA and world-renowned theatres including the Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Opera House, the Mariinsky Theatre, the Staatsoper Unter den Linden Berlin and the Polish National Opera in Warsaw. The power of Chinese opera has therefore been showcased on the world stage.

The singers keep their mission firmly in mind and remain true to their original aspiration, sparing no effort to spread the Chinese stories in their voices. Devoted to optimising the quality of Chinese opera commissions and carrying forward the spirit of the Chinese culture, the NCPA Resident Singers have toured Turin, Milan, Genoa, Florence, Parma, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Wuhan, Nanchang, Urumqi and other places.

The singers have starred in many national theatrical performances and international cultural exchange activities, including A Millennium Promise, a gala held at the “Belt and Road Forum” for International Cooperation, and The Great Journey, a gala held to celebrate the 100^th Anniversary of the Founding of the Communist Party of China. They are also extensively involved in other events, such as “100 Outreach Performances” and art education, singing for the people. What they do is an important part of the “Drip Irrigation Project” launched to popularise the elegant art and cultivate a Chinese opera audience.

As a trendsetter, inheritor and innovator with an open mind, the NCPA Resident Singers do everything “for the people, for art, for the world”, striving to promote the spread of operas in China and talk to the world through elegant art.

NCPA Drama Ensemble was established on July 28^th, 2016 and the Chairman of China Theatre Association, renowned Chinese actor PU Cunxin was invited to be the Artistic Director. It is another resident performance troupe following the China NCPA Chorus, the China NCPA Orchestra, and the NCPA Octet. Adhering to NCPA's principle of “for the people, for art, for the world”, the NCPA Drama Ensemble will focus on rehearsing dramas, participating in other NCPA productions and joining cultural exchange activities such as performing at grass-root units and campus. NCPA Drama Ensemble has taken part in several NCPA productions, including The LEI Family, The Royal Architects, Returning Home on a Snowy Night, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Jane Eyre, Hamlet, King Lear, The Merchant of Venice, Look West to Chang'an, A Doll's House, The Birds, The Tempest, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Crossroad, Crossroads, LIN Zexu, Crows and Sparrows, Il Servitore di Due Padroni, Twelfth Night, etc., and the Ensemble is to present more exciting works in the future.

China NCPA Chorus was established on December 8, 2009. It is the resident chorus of the China National Centre for the Performing Arts. 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 in China, 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.

As one of China’s leading choruses both in the opera and concert, the NCPA Chorus has participated in more than 60 Chinese and foreign operas produced by the NCPA such as Xishi, The Ballad of Canal, The Red Guards on Honghu Lake, Visitors on the Snow Mountain, FANG Zhimin, The Long March, The Daughter of the Party, Turandot, Carmen, La Traviata, Der Fliegende Holländer, and Aida. The chorus has also planned and performed in many large-scale vocal works and theme concerts including Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Mahler’s Eighth Symphonies, Verdi’s Requiem, and Concert to Commemorate the 110^th Anniversary of HUANG Zi’s Birth, opera concerts such as William Tell, Don Juan and so on. By means of the concerts, the chorus have get high appraisals by the high artistic standard. 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”.

In addition, they were invited to participate in the Opening ceremony of the XXIV Winter Olympic Games music recording, The National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference 2024 & 2025 New Year Tea Party Performance and other major national cultural activities. The chorus has actively demonstrated their mission and responsibility.

The NCPA Chorus has made unremitting efforts and continuous pursuit in art, and has accumulated a series of representative songs with distinctive artistic style like Take the Lead, The Moon Rises above the Island and so on. They have commissioned the creation and adaptation of The Sky-like Alashan, Crescent Moon and other works have been loved and widely praised by the audience.

The journey of music is full of beauty and joy. The NCPA Chorus has gone through a glorious history of 16 years. The artists of the chorus devote their most vigorous and dynamic youth to the cause of opera and chorus. Looking forward to a new journey, the NCPA Chorus will continue to sing without forgetting the original intention.

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 quickly established itself as one of the most adventurous and dynamic orchestras in the country and earned an international reputation through extensive performances abroad.

Numerous world-renowned artists have collaborated with the orchestra, including Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Valery Gergiev, Myung-Whun Chung, Christoph Eschenbach, Daniele Gatti, Jaap van Zweden, Fabio Luisi, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Leif Segerstam, Gunter Herbig, Shao-Chia Lu, ZHANG Xian, Rudolf Buchbinder, Stephen Kovacevich, Khatia Buniatishvili, Lang Lang, Yuja Wang, ZHANG Haochen, Víkingur Ólafsson, Kyung-Wha Chung, Vadim Repin, Siqing Lu, NING Feng, WANG Jian, Gautier Capucon, Alison Balsom, Sabine Meyer, Placido Domingo, Leo Nucci, and Renee Fleming 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”. Christoph Eschenbach also declared it as “one of the finest orchestras in Asia”.

Over the years, the orchestra has gained critical acclaim for its artistic excellence in both concerts and operas. To date they have played in over 70 NCPA opera productions, including classical repertoires such as Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, Tristan and Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Aida, Otello, Nabucco, Tosca, Turandot, The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Eugene Onegin, and newly commissioned works Rickshaw Boy, The Long March, Fang Zhimin, The Jinsha River, Visitors on the Snow Mountain and The Dawns Here Are Quiet. Their live recording of The Ring without Words with its creator, Lorin Maazel, was released on SONY Music worldwide, the only recording the great maestro ever made with an orchestra from China. 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 decade-long tenure of its Music Director LÜ Jia, the orchestra released a selection of live recordings conducted by him in 2022. 2024 saw the orchestra release its recording of the complete Bruckner symphonies, praised by Gramophone as "expressive and refulgent".

The orchestra has consistently offered creative and diverse programmes through its concert season. As part of its continuous efforts to promote contemporary music, the orchestra presented the China Premieres of major works by John Adams, Toru Takemitsu et al. and gave the World Premieres of dozens of substantial new orchestral works commissioned from composers across the globe, including Qigang Chen, ZHAO Jiping, Michael Gordon, Kalevi Aho, HUANG Ruo, Bright Sheng, Bernd Richard Deutsch, et al. It has also played a significant role in the NCPA's Young Composers Programme, providing a unique platform nurturing the next generation of composers in China.

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 Macao. 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”. In 2021, they appeared in "See Me: A Global Concert" along with world-wide artists, orchestras and choirs as part of the Opening Ceremony of the World Economic Forum’s Davos Agenda virtual event. In 2022, the orchestra recorded for the Opening Ceremony of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, accompanying billions of viewers as they witnessed the lighting of the Olympic flame. In April 2023, musicians from the orchestra visited South America, performing joint concerts with the Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestra in Brazil and the Instituto Superior de Arte del Teatro Colon in Argentina.

In 2025, the orchestra, led by Myung-Whun Chung, completed its first multi-country European tour, performing at the Edinburgh International Festival, Santander International Festival, and Elbphilharmonie, receiving“immediate and unanimous (ovation)” (Bachtrack), and was hailed by the Hamburger Abendblatt as "cleanly and richly sonorous…The ambition of this orchestra was unmistakably great".

With its commitment to educational and outreach activities, the orchestra has presented a series of Weekend Matinee Concerts at its home venue, providing local audience specially selected programmes and accessible ticket prices. The orchestra also frequently initiates wide-reaching educational projects in association with educational institutions across the city. In 2020, the orchestra launched an online concert series drawing an average audience of 30 million viewers. In 2024, the Beijing Youth Orchestra, operated by the NCPAO, participated in World Orchestra Week and made its international debut at Carnegie Hall. April 2021 saw the orchestra complete their first six-city national tour, which Music Weekly praised as "a series of sophisticated programs in concerts that blew the roof off,” followed by two national tours in March 2023 and March 2025.

In February 2012, LÜ Jia took up the post of Chief Conductor, succeeding Zuohuang Chen, NCPA’s then Artistic Director of Music as well as a founder of the orchestra. In January 2017, LÜ Jia started serving as NCPA's Artistic Director of Music and the NCPA Orchestra's Music Director. Beginning in the 2025/26 season, ZHANG Xian assumes the role of Principal Guest Conductor. In 2022, LAI Jiajing was appointed as Assistant Conductor.

Founded in 1980, the Liaoning Ballet is a famous Chinese ballet ensemble.

Since its founding, the Liaoning Ballet has staged 19 world classic ballets, including Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, La Sylphide, Le Corsaire and Don Quixote, on many of which it has the exclusive copyright in China. Further, Spartacus and Roméo et Juliette, produced and staged in cooperation with Yury Grigorovich, a leader in the international ballet community, were the first ballet versions of these two works to be launched in China. In addition to presenting classical masterpeices, the Liaoning Ballet collaborates actively with international masters in creating new classics. It has produced a new version of Swan Lake with Malakhov, a great dancer of the century, Notre Dame de Paris with Patrick de Bana, a world-renowned choreographer, and a unique version of The Nutcracker with Eldar Aliev, a meritorious artist of the Russian Federation, among others.

The Liaoning Ballet has produced and staged 19 Chinese ballet commissions including Moonlight Reflected on the Er-quan Spring, The Last Emperor and Qi Xi. Among the rest are Eight Heroines, which eulogises the fighting spirit of the Northeast Anti-Japanese United Forces, Mulan, which celebrates loyalty and filial piety, Iron Man, which praises the iron man spirit, a patriotic feeling harboured by a generation of oil workers, and Example, a ballet suite poem that extols the LEI Feng Spirit from the perspective of youth. Qi Xi is an ancient Chinese legend of love interpreted with contemporary vocabulary. The Liaoning Ballet’s ballet commissions have won many national awards including the Wenhua Award and National “Five-One Project” Award for Excellent Production.

In recent years, the Liaoning Ballet has appeared frequently on the world stage as a cultural messenger, and has toured five continents across the world. Many of its works have been selected for the “Chinese Culture Going Global Programme” by the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, for the China Service Demonstration Programme, and for the Chinese Culture Export Programme.