The building is a stone history book, but also a solidified music. In the big world of performing arts, there are some unique performing arts spaces, which are rooted in excellent historical buildings with deep connotations, "decorating" and "opening" buildings with art, and also using architecture to enhance the historical weight of art, mutual achievements, and shine in the "circle of friends" that is constantly expanding in the big world of performing arts.
Sinan Mansion turned around gracefully
51 historical garden houses, 30 outstanding historical buildings in Shanghai, the most European landscape in Shanghai Beach, once quite a lot of Shanghai celebrities settled here... Century-old Sinan, the former mansion dedicated to private use, has turned gracefully in the new century and integrated into the city's public cultural life.
As an important member of the performing arts world, in recent years, Sinan Mansion has launched two characteristic cultural brands of "Sinan Urban Space Art Festival" and "Sinan Appreciation Art Fair", building the entire historical district into a stage for modern cultural and artistic performances, presenting a wonderful humanistic picture and a strong public cultural atmosphere.
At the 5th Sinan Urban Space Arts Festival in October 2021, Sinan Mansion used indoor and outdoor full-space areas to launch a carnivalable open-air stage, an immersive theater and a time zone gallery that combines warmth and fashion. In three days, 100 young art creators presented nearly 70 wonderful performances including drama, dance, music, video, exhibitions, and new media.
Artistic performances based on weak lines, heavy vision, heavy interaction, and multi-focus performances, which can have a relationship with urban space, are the criteria for selecting programs for art festivals here. For example, the Fifth Arts Festival introduced small theater performances to Sinan Literature House for the first time, creating a "Sinan Theater" and launching a series of immersive performances with a sense of experience "bursting". Every audience member who comes here is both a viewer and a participant, and the entertainers interact and integrate with the audience in a unique environment to create a work with a strong sense of interaction.
"In the past five years, the festival has worked hard to make urban space a vehicle for displaying culture and art." Ms. Wang, who has participated in the festival for five consecutive years, watched the two dance programs of "Expression" and "Hug" this year, "During the performance, the audience followed the actors from Area A to Area F, and at the end of the performance, the dancers would also invite the audience to have a real hug with them." Enjoying the performance is enjoying the art, watching the building is also enjoying the art, the whole experience is really fantastic. Ms. Wang excitedly told reporters.
The "Sinan Appreciation Festival" brand pays more attention to the promotion and promotion of traditional Chinese culture. The art appreciation meeting is not simply to piece together different types of art, but to design and choreograph as a whole, and strive to form a designed and creative integration, and to show the contemporary beauty of traditional Chinese culture through a series of activities in a trinity of guided tours, performances and experiences, so that citizens and friends can experience the beauty and fun of China's excellent traditional culture in an amiable, playable and coke way.
From June to August 2021, the 4th Sinan Appreciation Fair focused on the theme of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, and launched a total of 8 art sharing activities, including "Pulse 100 - Percussion Celebration Session", "Purple Bamboo Rhyme - Jiangnan Silk Bamboo and Red Shikumen", and "The Right Way in the World is Vicissitudes - Shi Shi And Music". From red culture, Shanghai culture to Jiangnan culture, the Shanghai Chinese Orchestra performers crossed borders to join hands with artistic masters in opera, literature, Shanghai opera, poetry, recitation, commentary, painting and other fields to present classic plays to the audience every Friday night to feel the great spirit and glorious course of the founding of the party.
According to the relevant person in charge, the cohesion of cultural brand activities has enhanced the popularity of Sinan Mansion. New tenants settle in, old tenants renew their leases, and the overall operation of Sinan Mansion is more mature, entering a virtuous circle, and the economic and social benefits complement each other.
Jazz meets century-old buildings
On September 29, 2017, with the opening voice of popular New York jazz artist Veronica Swift, the Lincoln Jazz Shanghai Center on the 4th floor of "The Bund Center" opened its doors on the same day as the mall. Since then, whenever the lights first come on, the newly renovated "Bund Center" has been surrounded by the retro atmosphere and beautiful atmosphere of jazz.
The Lincoln Jazz Shanghai Center is a unique landscape in the world of performing arts. Adhering to tradition and innovation is the artistic attitude of jazz, which also coincides with the urban spirit of Shanghai's "Hai Na Bai Chuan". With jazz as the link, the center strives to create a "new space for performing arts" with Shanghai characteristics and jazz style, bringing more than 1,200 palace-level performances and jazz cultural activities with diverse forms and contents to nearly 300,000 audiences.
A hundred years ago, the Meilun Building, where the center is located, was finally completed in 1921 after a five-year construction period. The building was financed by the Jewish Isaac Edward Ezra, then known as the "Ezra Building", and belonged to the Edwardian neoclassical style, while within the larger category it belonged to the compromise between classical and neoclassical. In accordance with the concept of "repairing the old as old", after the completion of the "Meilun" repair in 2017, the structure and pattern of the building, such as the water-brushed stone façade, the main staircase, and the mosaic mosaic floor tiles, have been completely preserved and restored. Edward's neoclassical style and contemporary urban fashion coexist harmoniously, creating an artistic imagination that blends classical and fashion.
As the only sub-center set up by the world-famous Lincoln Jazz Center abroad, lincoln jazz Shanghai center reproduces the Jazz Club of the 1920s and 1930s in the stage design and table layout, allowing the audience to feel the original jazz stage without going abroad; in the space decoration, the overall color of the center adopts a calm and elegant reddish-brown system, decorated with drapery curtains with retro patterns, fully restoring the elegant memory of old Shanghai.
Since its inception, the Center has been committed to presenting the highest quality international jazz performances. Among the jazz performers who have appeared here are top jazz musicians from Lincoln like the Wynton Marsalis Grand Orchestra and Joshua Redman, as well as contemporary jazz superstars and Grammy Award winners such as Joe Lovano. Of course, the stage is also open to up-and-coming rookies, who have performed here, such as Marquis Hill and Ulysses Owens Jr.
Here, in the most comfortable way, the audience can even order a cocktail and watch the master's performance up close. The audience was immersed in the unique rhythm, and the body involuntarily swayed gently with the rhythm, which also made the artists on the stage more engaged and happy. Ding Xiaoyun, general manager of the center, said: "Shanghai is the most jazzy metropolis, and guests who come to 'Lincoln' are specially ticketed to see the performance. Music is not an optional backdrop for eating, drinking, or chatting, but a 'dinner' – and many artists are very willing to perform because of this. ”
In addition, the center has also made continuous efforts in jazz science popularization and talent incubation, and has launched themes and series of activities, in addition to regular performances, it has also planned the "Jazz Meet Folk Music" East-West Integration Project, the new album release concert, the festival special, the "Nova Project" Jazz Incubation Day, swing and tango ball and other series of performances and cultural activities, and through the annual Jazz Lincoln Life Festival and various outdoor performance activities, attract the public to stroll and visit the Bund Source, "Bund , Central" Cross Inner Courtyard and other well-known landmarks in Huangpu District.
In September 2021, the Lincoln Jazz Center Big Band was formed, which also marked that the center has a band of its own. The band is composed of 10 outstanding musicians, performing jazz masterpieces of various eras and familiar Shanghai Beach classics, and has presented more than ten performances so far, and made its outdoor debut on the outdoor stage at the 4th Lincoln Jazz Life Festival in October 2021. During the three-day performance, there are representative jazz band repertoire, as well as the re-arrangement and orchestration of the classics, which is refreshing.
Cheerful rhythm, long charm, century-old building and century-old jazz music continue to renew their vitality and enthusiasm. In the future, Lincoln Jazz Shanghai Center will be more abundant in the form of performances, committed to becoming an artistic business card that conveys jazz style and Bund style.
Reporter / Zhang Wen
Editor / Sun Chaohui
Image / Courtesy of the interviewee
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