‘New York is the ultimate Mecca for jazz’: Eugene Pao on his Lincoln Center date and the excitement of playing outside Hong Kong after 30 months at home
- After more than two years without an overseas gig, jazz guitarist Eugene Pao and his band begin a four-city US tour in mid-September, on the back of a new album
- Organised by the Hong Kong Economic And Trade Offices in New York, the tour is part of a campaign to remind the world that Hong Kong is still open for business
For any musician, the proverbial route to New York’s Carnegie Hall is “practise, practise, practise”. But to get to the Lincoln Center, guitarist Eugene Pao found a shortcut through the New York bureau of Hong Kong Economic And Trade Offices (HKETO).
The city’s top jazz artist wasn’t just invited to perform in the prestigious Big Apple venue; the Hong Kong government bureau organised a four-city American tour for him.
It’s all part of a campaign to remind trade partners that Hong Kong is still a vibrant, cosmopolitan city open for business. The other cities in which Pao will give concerts are Chicago, Washington and New Orleans.
“The HKETO’s Brussels office invited me in 2008 to do a European tour of nine cities. We had an incredible time, so they contacted me again last year, this time for the New York office,” Pao explains. “It was postponed for a year due to restrictions, but now it’s finally happening.”
“It’s the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong as a [Special Administrative Region of China] so they’ve been really keen to make this happen,” Pao says.