HKAPA

Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra.

The title of National Class One Conductor was conferred on Yan Huichang at the First Professional Appraisal of China in 1987. He was appointed Music Director of the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra in June 1997 and was re-titled as its Artistic Director and Principal Conductor in 2003. Mr Yan was awarded the ‘Cultural Medallion (Music)’ by the National Arts Council of Singapore in 2001 and a Bronze Bauhinia Star by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region in 2004. In 2008, he won the Jurors’ Award for Conducting at the 6th China Gold Record Awards in the Multi Arts Category.

After graduating from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music in 1983, Yan was appointed Principal Conductor-cum-Artistic Director of the Chinese National Orchestra of China. Mr Yan has worked with all the professional Chinese orchestras in China and abroad. Apart from conducting on the concert stage, Mr Yan is also a composer, winning numerous awards for his compositions, and composing and producing digital music for record releases.

In recent years, Mr Yan has been appointed visiting professor by several musical institutions including the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and Central Conservatory of Music, and has given lectures and presentations in Hong Kong, in China, and in other parts of the world. In 2006, he was instrumental in proposing and the subsequent implementation of the Professional Orchestra Internship scheme through collaboration between the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts and the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra. He was appointed a Visiting Scholar in Chinese Music for the Academy’s School of Music in 2009, and presented masterclasses in Conducting for Chinese Orchestras at the Academy.

Led by Mr Yan, the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra has seen growth in all directions and is a driving force behind the promotion of Chinese musical culture in China as well as in other parts of the world.