4th Greater Bay Area Film Concert unites global Chinese hearts with celebration
A star-studded lineup of 80 artists from the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and overseas gathered in Macao on Sunday, delivering 60 performances that wove a rich tapestry of shared ancestry and Chinese identity at the fourth Greater Bay Area Film Concert.
Since its inception in 2021, this annual musical feast, timed around the Mid-Autumn Festival, has become a highly anticipated highlight of the region’s cultural calendar.
Riding on the festive mood and a heightened longing for reunions during this traditional holiday, the film concert has established itself as a prestigious annual fixture that brings together artists and audiences from across the Chinese-speaking world to forge bonds and deepen cultural and artistic dialogue, said Mok Ian-ian, deputy chairperson of the Macau Federation of Cultural Sectors Associations.
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Mok expressed hope that the event will remain rooted in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area — a bridgehead for East-West cultural exchanges — and continue to showcase Chinese culture to a global audience, closely tied to Chinese communities worldwide.
The concert was structured in four acts. The first segment reached its crest when singers Wang Leehom and Shan Yichun joined voices for Falling Leaves Return to Roots — a tribute to Wang’s late granduncle, historian Hsu Cho-yun (1930-2025), born in Xiamen, Fujian province, who later moved to Taiwan, and then settled in the US, before passing away in August.
The second act evoked nostalgia with Jin Haixin and Liu Yuxin’s rendition of Walking Through the Coffee Shop, a song by the late Taiwan singer Qian Baihui (1963-2025), who settled on the mainland in the 1990s. Qian died in Beijing last month.
The third chapter focused on the event’s heritage, weaving theme songs from the past three editions of the concert into a free-flowing tale of homecoming.
The fourth part spotlighted Taiwan singer Ling Feng singing I Love My Country, a homage to and personal reconnection with his lifelong friend Velu Peter Gana (1943-2025), who composed the song. Gana, born in Chengdu, Sichuan province, and raised in Taiwan, died in June.
Backstage, before the show, Ling, 80, shared with the media, often breaking into lyrics from the song to explain his feelings about his mainland hometown, including his hope to return in the future.
In 1987, Ling became the first Taiwan artist to pay a public visit to the mainland, camera in hand, striding across more than 30 mainland cities to film Eight Thousand Miles of Clouds and Moon — a landmark work that remains a guiding map for compatriots from Taiwan who come to explore the motherland.
Ling described himself as “a ferryman” shuttling between the two sides. “My greatest achievement was to gain the trust of my mainland counterparts — a foundation upon which peace, shared collaboration and prosperity between Taiwan and the mainland must rest,” he said.
Ling’s performance set the stage for American singer-songwriter Bertie Higgins, also 80, who performed Casablanca, his 1982 hit. Higgins lavished praise on Macao, a city that he said had grown since his last trip as a tourist years before.
Mok said that the film concert’s success lies in its ability to resonate on a personal level with every viewer, regardless of age or background.
This personal connection resonates strongly with people of Chinese heritage across the world, she added, playing on their collective memory and patriotic sentiment.
Flora Ni and Nick Yang contributed to this story.
Contact the writer at wanqing@chinadailyhk.com
