A dressing down for stuffy classics

Summer has come. London has the Proms Festival from mid July to mid September, while the Berlin Philharmonic ends its season with an open-air concert on the Waldbuhne stage in the capital's forests. The point is all these concerts are informal, unconventional and relaxed. Audience members can wear T-shirts and shorts instead of black ties and evening dresses.

This summer the National Center for the Performing Arts (NCPA) will bring the concept to Beijing by launching a week-long festival called "Roam About Classics", which presents popular pieces of classical music to large audiences in an informal setting.

"A Proms concert means a promenade concert, or a concert where part of the audience stands in a "promenade" area of the hall. With a history of 115 year, London's Proms reaches a wider audience by offering more popular programs, adopting a less formal promenade arrangement, and keeping ticket prices low," NCPA music director Chen Zuohuang says.