A Concert About Love… and the toilet paper shortage in Hong Kong.
(One of the images provided by artist Yu Wing-Yan, featuring a black and white photo of Hong Kong’s buildings and mountain range, Photo from Songs of Virotopia)
Edited by Lianne Lee
Yes, you read that right. Daniel Lo Ting-Cheung, an award-winning composer who graduated from the University of York, was commissioned by the Hong Kong Arts Festival to create a multimedia concert based on local literary history.
“Songs of Virotopia” or [疫托邦之歌] is the name of the concert, and as you may be able to guess from the title (of both the article and the concert), the theme of the nine songs is based on the pandemic situation in Hong Kong. All 9 songs featured are poems selected by Daniel Lo from the poetry collection “Love in the time of the pandemic” [愛在瘟疫時], which was written by infamous Chinese poet and writer Ho Fuk yan (何福仁), and converted into songs that a six-person ensemble will perform.
One of the poems selected for performance is a comedic interpretation of the toilet paper shortage in Hong Kong that occurred in 2020. It conveys a story of a thief holding a supermarket delivery man at knifepoint, robbing him of hundreds of rolls of toilet paper.
The multimedia aspect of the concert comes from Artist Yu Wing-Yan, who provided historical and contemporary images of Hong Kong through different eras that would help provide additional information and context to the songs performed.
The concert will be performed in Cantonese with English and Chinese Subtitles at HKICC Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity Multimedia Theatre, Nov 19, 8 pm and Nov 20, 3 pm
References
Daniel LO Ting-cheung. (n.d.). Hong Kong Sinfonietta. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from
https://hksl.org/composer/daniel-lo-ting-cheung/
T. (n.d.). [FEATURE] "LOVE IN THE TIME OF CORONAVIRUS: POSTSCRIPT AND TEN POEMS"
BY HO FUK YAN. Cha Journal.
https://chajournal.blog/2021/05/17/love-in-the-time-of-coronavirus/
Tsui, E. (2022, November 16). Toilet paper shortages and other Hong Kong pandemic
stories given musical spin. South China Morning Post.
https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/article/3199786/toilet-paper-shortages-and-other-hong-kong-pandemic-stories-given-musical-spin
