Garbage trucks on Saturday inadvertently disrupted a performance by the New Japan Philharmonic World Dream Orchestra in the National Taiwan University Sports Center when they started loudly playing prerecorded tunes that signal waste collection, sparking outrage from classical music fans attending the event.
The internationally renowned orchestra was performing in the sports center when the trucks came to collect trash and recycling, playing music that twice disrupted musicians, sources said.
City garbage trucks play Ludwig van Beethoven’s Fur Elise and Tekla Badarzewska-Baranowska’s A Maiden’s Prayer at each collection stop to alert residents of collection times.
Photo courtesy of BigArt
The truck music reportedly surprised conductor Joe Hisaishi, who looked around the venue for its source before giving up and waiting for the tune to finish. He then smiled and gave a polite bow in its general direction before resuming the performance, a gesture that earned him applause from the audience.
However, netizens flooded the Facebook page of BigArt, the concert’s organizer, with angry posts, saying the company showed no regard for acoustics while selecting the venue and failed to anticipate the scheduled garbage collection, which showed no respect to ticket-buyers or performers.
“They lost our face to the world,” one netizen said.
“Now I have listened to garbage trucks for the first time during a concert; I will remember this for the rest of my life,” another said.
BigArt said the acoustic problems and the arrival of garbage trucks between 8pm and 9:10pm were known to Japanese organizers, and they had tried adjusting the schedule, but withheld the information from the musicians to “avoid affecting their performance.”
BigArt said that it had told Japanese organizers that the National Theater and Concert Hall were unavailable, and the orchestra said that background noises should not cause problems.
It said that Hisaishi asked staff members about the noise in a curious way and joked about it after the performance.
BigArt said that it accepts public criticisms and would use them to improve its conduct.
Formal concerts are usually performed at professional venues, but even purpose-built concert halls could be overwhelmed by unwanted noise, National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra chief of marketing and planning Huang Fu-ming (黃馥茗) said.
Huang said a performance by the symphony orchestra was once interrupted by fireworks near a venue, adding that such situations can only be averted by coordinating with city authorities and organizers of other events.
Universal Music Taiwan Ltd director of jazz and classical music Bernard Fu (傅慶良) said the sports center is not designed to host musical performances and coordination is necessary if a orchestra performs at the venue.
“The concert could have taken place on days when there are no garbage collection, like Wednesdays or Sundays, or they could have asked trucks not to play music when they were in the neighborhood,” Fu said.
Fu added that the incident is unusual because in Taiwan, complaints are typically made by local residents against the concert organizers and performers, citing the example of pop singer A-mei’s (張惠妹) concert at the Taipei Arena last year.
Additional reporting by Kuo An-chia
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
RESPONSE: The government would investigate incidents of Taiwanese entertainers in China promoting CCP propaganda online in contravention of the law, the source said Taiwanese entertainers living in China who are found to have contravened cross-strait regulations or collaborated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) could be subject to fines, a source said on Sunday. Several Taiwanese entertainers have posted on the social media platform Sina Weibo saying that Taiwan “must be returned” to China, and sharing news articles from Chinese state media. In response, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has asked the Ministry of Culture to investigate whether the entertainers had contravened any laws, and asked for them to be questioned upon their return to Taiwan, an official familiar with the matter said. To curb repeated
Myanmar has turned down an offer of assistance from Taiwanese search-and-rescue teams after a magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck the nation on Friday last week, saying other international aid is sufficient, the National Fire Agency said yesterday. More than 1,700 have been killed and 3,400 injured in the quake that struck near the central Myanmar city of Mandalay early on Friday afternoon, followed minutes later by a magnitude 6.7 aftershock. Worldwide, 13 international search-and-rescue teams have been deployed, with another 13 teams mobilizing, the agency said. Taiwan’s search-and-rescue teams were on standby, but have since been told to stand down, as
RSS