Taking a leaf from the summer music traditions of orchestras abroad, the intrepid Yu Long is bringing classical music to an outdoor concert festival.

Yu Long conducting the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, before the New York Philharmonic took over at a recent outdoor concert in New York. [China Daily]

Two weeks ago, some 30,000 people attended the out-door concert by the New York Philharmonic and Shanghai Symphony Orchestra on the Great Lawn at Central Park, New York. It was the first time in the 46-year history of the Philharmonic's summer music tradition that it was sharing a park program with a guest ensemble. Lang Lang, the Chinese keyboard star joined the Shanghai Symphony to play Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue for the concert's climax. Some among the home audience caught the performance on Shanghai TV and Dragon TV the next day. But nothing can match the atmosphere of a live show.

Knowing this only too well, Yu Long, artistic director of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, is now bringing this summer music trend to China.

While the New York Philharmonic has the Concerts in the Parks summer program, Tanglewood has been the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home since 1937 and the Berlin Philharmonic has been holding open-air concerts since 1984 at the Waldbuhne theater nestled in a natural valley.