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Candid Local View of Chengdu's Music Scene

Janos Gereben on September 9, 2014
Zaha Hadid's Chengdu Contemporary Art Centre
Zaha Hadid's Chengdu Contemporary Art Centre

"Classical concerts are one of the things that makes this city attractive," says a resident of Chengdu (a propos the item above), probably the same person who wrote the story about Barnaby Palmer. She then presents this candid report:

Yet apart from the hideously priced tours of some musicians, the regular concerts are not listed on douban.com where gochengdoo.com sources its events list ...

Sichuan Symphony Orchestra is one that I really want to like, but it seems indifferent to the concept of having an audience, its marketing promotion is quite terrible if not nonexistent (apart from specially sponsored concert). The only way that I could find out about SSO’s upcoming concerts is to check 228.com.cn every now and then, 228.com.cn is where its tickets online are exclusively sold, usually not long before the concert starts. Unlike damai.cn, 228.com.cn doesn’t provide a collecting service at the door, so one needs to leave enough time for its delivery (10 yuan) or go to collect in their office in working hour.

For most concerts you could get ticket at door before the concert starts since it’s not very likely to sold out. After a concert with new music director Barnaby Palmer from Belgium [?] in October, it’s been away for two months. I was excited to find two concerts appeared silently on 228.com.cn earlier last week, and was the first one to buy a ticket. Even until just now, however, only 7 tickets have been sold for this Friday’s concert, 4 of which were to me.