China National Traditional Orchestra launches youth theater troupe

China National Traditional Orchestra launched its youth theater troupe in Beijing on Sunday.

At the launching ceremony, centered around "Bringing Chinese stories to the world", the troupe's new productions and touring plans for this year were announced.

This January, the orchestra, QFun Theater, a troupe dedicated to children's theater education, and Guangzhou Opera House coproduced a children's play Compendium of Materia Medica.

From this collaboration, the orchestra and QFun Theater decided to create a youth theater troupe, aiming to integrate Chinese traditional music with theater, and tell Chinese stories from the perspective of children and teenagers.

The young members of the newly established theater troupe performed excerpts from Compendium of Materia Medica at the event, as well as poetry recital A Spring Morning and choir singing Looking for the Moon.

"Art can help children open up their imagination, and I hope there will be a place where children's creativity can be inspired and exercised. That is why we decided to established this youth theater troupe," said Zhao Cong, head of the orchestra. "In the past, our orchestra played folk songs and Chinese classical music. Now, we want to tell Chinese stories to the world."

This year, the theater troupe plans to launch an international tour to bring Compendium of Materia Medica to Turkmenistan, France and the United Kingdom, as well as major cities in China.

The troupe's new original play The Book of Odes, incorporating traditional Chinese music, acrobatics and magic tricks, will also be produced and premiere later this year.