Photo: Courtesy of the Tianqiao Performing Arts Center

From ballet and dramas to musicals, Beijing's Tianqiao Performing Arts Center is set to stage more than 28 plays and performances during its annual Spring for Chinese Arts Festival, which is set to run until June, the center announced on Wednesday. 

The festival will have five sections: China's Stories, Biography, Chinese Traditional Operas, Modern City and Oriental Imagery. 

The China's Stories section includes the drama White Deer Plain, which is adapted from the Chinese classic literature work of the same name; the musical Ideal City, about young people striving toward their dreams; and the Beijing-style drama Guijie, which explores the 30 years of development at Beijing's renowned food street Guijie. Chinese traditional operas like Peking Opera and Kunqu Opera will be performed as well. Additionally, some popular novels will be adapted into new musicals for the festival. 

A seminar was held at the launch ceremony on Wednesday, at which scholars, experts and theater insiders shared their opinions and suggestions to advance the development of Beijing's performing arts. 

Zhang Li, general manager of the Tianqiao Performing Arts Center, emphasized the center's contributions toward building Beijing into a capital for performing arts. 

In his speech, Song Guanlin, vice chairman of the China Cultural Management Association, said that theaters today are not only places for performances, but also production studios for training talent. 

"Therefore, to build a new relationship between the city and the theater, two things need to be done," said Song. "We must not only handle the political positioning of a theater, but also handle its cultural positioning. It must also integrate with the times, integrate with society and the surrounding environment, and integrate with the aesthetic tastes of audiences."