The Happy Family Work-in-Process Showcase

© Wilson Au Yeung

Artistic Concept & Music

Daniel Ting-cheung Lo is one of the most active composers in Hong Kong, frequently commissioned by local music groups such as Hong Kong Sinfonietta and The Hong Kong New Music Ensemble.

One of Lo’s current compositional interests is to seek ways to integrate music with Hong Kong literature. Recent works inspired by contemporary local writers include two pieces written for music programme Hong Kong Odyssey, commissioned by Hong Kong Arts Festival 2017; a choral work Mary’s Chalk Circle for narration, unaccompanied choir and video, presented by Hong Kong Voices in June 2017; a chamber opera A Woman Such as Myself (based on Xixi’s short story A Girl Like Me), premiered in New Opera Days Ostrava (Czech Republic) in June 2018; a semi-staged cantata The Banquet at el Bulli (based on Ye Si’s short story) was presented by Hong Kong Voices in January 2020. In 2019/2020, Lo and novelist Eva Wong were commissioned by Hong Kong Arts Festival to collaborate on a chamber opera in Cantonese Women Like Us, adapted from two of Xixi's short stories A Girl Like Me and The Cold (originally scheduled to be staged in 2020 and is now postponed due to pandemic).

Lo completed his PhD (Composition) at the University of York in the UK in 2017 under the supervision of William Brooks, fully supported by the Hong Kong Jockey Club Music and Dance Fund. Previously, he studied composition with Chan Hing-yan at the University of Hong Kong where he graduated with first class honours in 2009 and then earned an MPhil (Music Composition) in 2012.

Text

Hong Kong writer Wong Yi is the winner of several literary awards, including the Hong Kong Arts Development Awards 2018 Award for Young Artist (Literary Arts). She has been a judge at local literary competitions, and a columnist at various local newspapers and magazines, including Ming Pao Weekly, Sunday Ming Pao, Fleurs des lettres, Linepaper. She is currently the editor-at-large at Fleurs des lettres and the host of RTHK’s radio programme “Book Review”, and is one of Unitas Magazine’s “20 Young Sinophone Novelists To Watch”.

She is the author of 3 short stories collections The Four Seasons of Lam Yip (2019), Patched Up (2015), and News Stories (2010). Selected stories and essays were translated into English and published in Neighborhood (Spicy Fish Cultural Production, 2019) and The Pulse of Nature — Mid-Levels West (MCCM Creations, 2019). In 2019, at the invitation of the Hong Kong Arts Festival, she wrote the libretto for the Cantonese-language chamber opera Women Like Us by Hong Kong composer Daniel Lo.

Wong graduated from the University of Hong Kong reading Psychology and Comparative Literature and holds a Master of Arts in English from King’s College London.

Video & Animation

Yu Wing-yan is a multi-talented media artist. Her wide range of works include illustration, animation, videography, and sound. She concerns interrelation between arts, creators and its receivers, and believes the undiscoverable sensation and intelligence could be portrayed in art. 

Recently she made a number of documentaries on Hong Kong craftsmen, documenting their creative process with which she explored the experimentality of videography, computer application and sound. She is also keen on expanding the potential of drawing and animation as a medium of storytelling. Her works have been shown in Hong Kong, Denmark, London, by Hong Kong Museum of Art (2019), Dynamo (2018), SPLICE (2018), The Fringe Club (2017), Cattle Depot Artists Village (2017), JCCAC (2017), RTHK (2016), among others. In 2017, she collaborated with Hong Kong composer Daniel Lo and made the video for his Mary’s Chalk Circle for narration, unaccompanied choir and video.

Yu received her Bachelor of Arts (Visual Studies) from Lingnan University in 2011, and her Master of Fine Art (Creative Media) from School of Creative Media, the City University of Hong Kong in 2019. 

© Menu Tsai

Devising Performer / Narrator

Winner of the Best Actor in the 22nd Hong Kong Drama Awards (Comedy/Farce), Yau Chung Wai is regarded as one of the most prominent actors in Hong Kong. Besides being a freelance actor, theatre instructor and a member of the music group, “Da air refresher”, Yau Chung Wai has founded The LOL Drama Workshop, dedicated to offering themed performance training programs for stage, film and TV practitioners.

Recently, he has been nominated for Best Actor (Tragedy/serious drama) at the Hong Kong Dramas Awards and awarded as Best Actor of International Association of Theatre Critics (Hong Kong). Yau graduated from the School of Drama, Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts with a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) degree, majoring in acting.

 Conductor

Angus Lee is a versatile Hongkong-based performer-composer. Trained as a flautist, Lee completed his studies at The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (HKAPA) in 2014 and the Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in 2016 with the highest honours, with full scholarships from the Aedas Foundation and the Hong Kong Jockey Club Music and Dance Fund. Parallel to his flute and composition training, Lee studied conducting under the tutelage of Alan Cumberland (HKAPA) and Sian Edwards (RAM). He has taken part in conducting masterclasses organised by the Asian Youth Orchestra and the Orkney Conductors' Course.

A keen promoter of new music, Lee has led numerous world and regional premieres of works by Hong Kong and international composers. He often steps up to conduct the premieres of new works at music festivals within a short notice, notably, conducting the Frankfurt-based Ensemble Modern at the world premiere of 7 new works by young composers in the Ticino Musica Festival 2019. Other notable conducting performances include Hong Kong premieres of works by Nico Muhly, Franck Bedrossian and Guillaume Connesson at the PRISM Chamber Music Festival (Hong Kong; 2018 & 2019). He also performance as a conductor at the ACL Asian Music Festival (Japan; 2017) and the ilSUONO Contemporary Music Week (Italy; 2016).