HKBU Symphony Orchestra will hold a live concert on 28 June at 8 pm in the Concert Hall of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre. The Orchestra will be conducted by its music director Professor Johnny Poon, Head of the Department of Music, and the concert will feature Hong Kong soprano Ms Vivian Yau.

The concert programme includes the world premiere of Dr Camilo Mendez’s (White) Planes in Dissolution, as well as performances of Edward Elgar’s Introduction and Allegro, Op.47 and Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Vocalise, Op. 34 No. 14 and Symphony No. 2 in E Minor, Op. 27.

Dr Camilo Mendez joined the Department of Music as an Assistant Professor in 2018. He is a contemporary music composer. His works are conceived as compositional cycles: a series of pieces orbiting around the same musical ideas, but they are also written for different instrumental combinations. The HKBU Symphony Orchestra will present the world premiere of Dr Mendez’s (White) Planes in Dissolution. The compositional cycle (White) Planes in Dissolution was inspired by the suprematist painting of the same name by Kazimir Malevich (1879-1935) and the following quotes: 

“Suprematism is the dominance of the object by colour.” 
Kazimir Malevich, 1915

“Black and white serve as energy to disclose shape.”
Kazimir Malevich, 1915

To date, only two works of the cycle have been completed. The first is a prepared piece for a saxophone quartet, and the second piece, which is for a chamber orchestra, will be performed at the concert. Three more are currently in the works, and they will be completed in the near future.