The 33rd Golden Melody Awards for Traditional Arts and Music announced a total of 42 shortlisted artists and 91 works of which the special awards will be awarded to CHIMEI Culture Foundation (奇美文化基金會) and renowned Taiwanese opera singer Yang Li-hua (楊麗花) for their achievements in the fields of publishing and performance arts, respectively. The awards ceremony will be held on Oct. 29.
CHIMEI Culture Foundation was established in 1977 and has been devoted to arts and culture charity for years, it is also responsible for managing the collection of the CHIMEI Museum. The museum is known for housing the world's largest violin collection and allows musicians to borrow from its violin collection free of charge. It also released nearly a hundred classical CDs and set up CHIMEI Art Award to cultivate art and music talents. The foundation spared no effort in popularizing classical music and cultivating Taiwanese soft power.
Yang became a member of a Taiwanese opera troupe at the age of 13, she experienced every era of Taiwanese opera from airing on radio, movies, and television, to the theaters. Yang's powerful voice, handsome appearance, great acting, and charisma turned traditional opera into a form of pop culture and attracted audiences of different generations to fall for Taiwanese opera. She not only witnessed the evolution of Taiwanese opera but her name "Yang Li-hua" has become synonymous with Taiwanese opera because she is the first person that comes to mind when mentioning Taiwanese opera.
Addressing the press conference, Culture Minister Lee Yung-te stated that during the past two and a half years, people have been suffering due to the pandemic, but everyone was still productive and he expressed his admiration to everyone for keeping the creative energy while performances were cut back.
Minister Lee indicated that the government has been supporting tangible cultural assets in the past, but more attention will be paid to intangible cultural assets in the future. MOC will provide financial aid to preserve the classics of traditional arts as well as encourage cross-border collaborations.