Cape Town Philharmonic Brass Quintet to hold free pop-up concert at St Georges Mall

The public will be treated to a variety of arrangements over lunchtime, including a Beatles Suite and an Ain’t Misbehavin’ Suite for jazz lovers out there. The performance is the latest in the Cape Town Central City Improvement District’s (CCID) Come Back To Town initiative, which aims to encourage people to visit the central city and enjoy everything it has to offer to reinvigorate the CBD economy.

Having launched late last year, the Come Back To Town campaign is aimed at attracting employees, businesses and visitors back to the Cape Town CBD following the various levels of lockdown restrictions. “Even though we’ve entered into a new year, the pandemic is still with us and its harsh economic after-effects remain. We need to encourage the public to return to the CBD and show their support for our resilient central city businesses,” says Tasso Evangelinos, CEO of the CCID.

The Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO) has also suffered the consequences of Covid-19 and has had to switch from regular live performances with packed audiences to online options when it could. “Our challenges included a loss of box office income and a halt on hiring out the orchestra to companies such as the St Petersburg Ballet and Cape Town City Ballet. Suddenly our performers, who are used to a responsive audience, were performing in a vacuum,” says Louis Heyneman, CEO of the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra.

The company reinvented itself as an online arts company, through video and collaborations. Adds Heyneman: “We introduced a series of Covid-19 videos, performing works designed to uplift audiences, and participated in online concerts and some in-person performances when possible, including a series titled the ‘Symphonic Masterpieces in Music’ in October.” The CPO was also able to participate in the National Arts Festival and the Klein Karoo Klassique Festival, where it shortlisted for the Fiesta Awards next month.

“The performance by the Cape Town Philharmonic Brass Quintet is just one of the many ways we want to remind people what they have been missing and entice them back to the heart of downtown Cape Town,” concludes Evangelinos.