Hong Kong Cultural Centre

I grew up in the middle of Tsim Sha Tsui (right above the former Lane Crawford on Nathan Road and Cameron Road across the muslim temple) when the area around the Star Ferry was fairly unmolested, by the time I immigrated to U.S. in 1988 the Hong Kong Cultural Centre was still being built, I remembered being rather curious about the oddly shaped architecture. The building wasn’t finished when I returned to HK for vacation in 1989 summer, but it was finally completed on my next trip back.
It looked quite neat inside and I remembered there being a big deal about the big pipe organ inside. As I finally heard an actual organ being played in college, I became quite interested that Hong Kong got one such instrument and was interested in hearing it. I think I listened to one or 2 free organ recitals that summer. Little did I know that I would eventually get to play the instrument itself and perform a recital there myself.
As you can see already, this is not a typical review of the venue, and more of an impression of the concert hall and the organ…
The shape of the concert hall rather strange for acoustics reasons, I like the texture of the soft green seats though it packs rather tightly with each other and doesn’t provide much wiggle room for someone with a «larger girth» like yours truly. The massive contraption with all the spotlights and the wooden panels which are used to redirect orchestral sound to the audience block out the sound from the organ so the audiences do not get the full effect.
The attached console gives the organist a slight sense of vertigo, but nowhere quite near as bad as the Fisk at Stanford’s MemChu.
The action of the manuals are quite heavy and when fully coupled are near impossible to play. I remembered severely spraining my wrists practicing Widor’s 6^th. on that, my wrists were so swollen it was practically a live example of 腫到變豬蹄!! So it is a welcome relief that they have installed electrical assist on the couplers, I had a much easier time playing this organ today. Though the action on each single manual is still a bit on the heavy side.
The chamade is LOUD, and not only that, they have 3(!!!) independent chamades!
The reeds are a little off, some more than others. So I tend to avoid them when I can.
On the positive side, I do love mixtures, even the pedal organ has 2 mixtures! And to my surprise, it is «mostly» in tune!
The pedals are not AGO, but not exactly complete flat. It took a while to get used to but I like the tracker action on them. The pedals go a bit deeper than normal run of the mill AGO pedalboards, I really like them. Though they are extremely worn and could use either some resurfacing and replacing altogether.
I am not sure about their claim of having 8000 pipes, I have never encountered an organ with such an exact count! A closer inspection of the specs shows a count of about 105 ranks on the manuals and 23 ranks on the pedals assuming no unification and giving the max # of ranks to the mixtures, that should be 105×61 + 23×32 = 6405 + 733 = 7138 pipes, where are the other 862 pipes???
Still, any organ with over 100 ranks is gargantuan, and I do have fun playing this beast. A very solid 3 stars.

The truth is, a lot of people didn’t like the design of Cultural Centre when it was first built. No windows or visible characteristics. No nothing.
But hey, it has been functioning well and serving its purpose perfectly for the last 25 years. Drama, musical, orchestra, dance, art exhibition. The halls are specifically designed and built for each purposes, so I was never disappointed. And because of the design, you wouldn’t notice how big it actually is.
I didn’t do counts, but I’m certain I am always here for some activities once a year.
I’m amazed by Cultural Centre, and I have zero complaints about it. It is the main fortress in HK to protect the art and culture, and fight against the luxury brands just two streets to its left.
And to add to that, it’s always in the memory of most HK people to spend the Christmas eve in TST, especially the plaza in front of Cultural Centre.

«Mamma who bore me
Mamma who gave me
No way to handle things
Who made me so sad. «
It started off like this with the lead actress standing centre staged, touching herself while singing this beautifully written song that depicts the heartbreaking impact of confusing adolescence on the youth.
Or this one.
«Use that pride in our hearts to lift us up tomorrow
’Cause just to sit still would be a sin «
As the proud women leads the crowd on a rally to fight against the discrimination towards coloured people in America in the 50s.
The first one is from Spring Awakening while the second one is from Hairspray and they were performed by Face Production at Cultural Centre. Compared to neighboring countries, Hong Kong certainly is among the worst place to be in terms of bringing in Broadway Musicals. As a musical lover, it pains me to see that one of the hottest Broadway shows, Wicked, had been to Japan, Korea and the Philippines, everywhere but Hong Kong. And the Broadway production Hong Kong had last time as I could recall was The Phantom of the Opera ages ago.
I do not know why Hong Kong is less appealing for those productions to actually come to Hong Kong. I am not sure if it is because of the government or the lack of interest in musicals of the general public. Luckily Hong Kong too has nice local productions and at least I could have a taste on those musicals here in Hong Kong. Face production is one of those that strive to bring musicals to the masses here in the territories and they often perform at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Studio Theatre. Honestly if you ask me, I just wish there are more shows coming.
If anything, at least the Broadway production of Avenue Q will be coming this year.