Page 115 of 135.
192
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
ADDRESS BY CHAIRMAN
CHAIRMAN (in English): --Ladies and gentlemen, I will now proceed with the business of today's meeting.
MINUTES
The minutes of the meetings held on 7th and 9th December, 1976 were confirmed.
PAPER
The following paper was laid on the table :-
Report to the Urban Council by the Director of Urban Services and Secretary, Urban Council, for the month of December, 1976.
QUESTIONS
(1) Mr. B. A. BERNACCHI asked the following question (in English):-
The Concert Hall stage has always been too shallow for live performances such as ballet, opera or even plays, musical or otherwise. This is partly because of the choir stalls at the back. I understand that these stalls are there mainly because they provide cover for expensive equipment required for the lighting, such as transformers, resistances, etc. Equipment recently modified and computerized can now be obtained and, in consequence, heavy equipment particularly behind the stage is no longer necessary. Can therefore steps be taken to remove the choir stalls, which are seldom even used, so as to increase the depth of the stage in order to meet the requirements of the majority of live performances?
MR. F. K. HU, CHAIRMAN OF THE CITY HALL AND ENTERTAINMENTS SELECT COMMITTEE, replied as follows (in English):-
Mr. Chairman, the proposal made in this question was carefully considered by the City Hall and Entertainments Committee in May last year, together with other possible improvements to the Concert Hall for theatrical productions. The Select Committee noted that:-
(a) The concert hall was designed primarily for music, and any attempt to convert it to suit theatrical production would run the risk of ruining its superb acoustics.
(b) The cost of the work involved, estimated at $650,000, would not guarantee a first-class concert hall for both music and theatrical production, apart from the fact that it would still do nothing to enlarge the present limited wing space which would involve major structural alterations.
(c) The work would necessitate the closure of the concert hall for about four months and this would be undesirable in view of the very heavy public demand.
(d) Since drama would be taken care of in the new cultural complex, it was preferable not to change the present concert hall but to await the new auditoria.
(Mr. Edmund W. H. CHOW and Miss Cecilia L. Y. YEUNG arrived at this point.)
MR. BERNACCHI (in English):-Mr. Chairman, first of all, would the Chairman of the City Hall Select Committee elaborate on how it would run the risk of ruining the superb acoustics to enlarge the stage itself?
MR. HU (in English):—Mr. Chairman, the possible improvement we studied in May was that we knew the difficulty in making the spoken word clearly audible in performances of drama, and we got the opinion from the acoustic consultant, and the suggestion made, gave us no guarantee that it would meet both requirements of good acoustics for music and drama.
(Mr. Hilton CHEONG-LEEN and Dr. Denny M. H. HUANG arrived at this point.)
MR. BERNACCHI (in English):-The Chairman of the City Hall and Entertainments Select Committee says that the drama would be taken care of in the new cultural complex. When will the theatre or the concert hall in the new cultural complex be built?
MR. HU (in English):-There are two auditoria; the large one has the capacity of 2,500 persons and the small one 1,000. The large one is scheduled to be completed in April, 1981 and the smaller one in March, 1982.
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
193
Page 115
Page 116
Page 116 of 135