Chinese Gala Is Musically Attuned
Sue Hsu of Laguna Niguel wasn’t taking any chances.
She wore a red and gold dress to the “Year of the Rat” New Year celebration on Friday sponsored by the Chinese-American League of the Pacific Symphony.
The Chinese believe those colors bring good luck, she explained. “Even when we go to a wedding we wear red or gold--to bring good fortune to the bride and groom.”
Three hundred guests--more than half of them from the Los Angeles area--gathered at the Westin South Coast Plaza hotel in Costa Mesa to raise funds for the Showcase of Young Musicians, an annual statewide competition for Chinese artists. The event will be June 2 at the Irvine Barclay Theater.
During the cocktail reception, Sally Uy of West Los Angeles said her family would share a banquet when they celebrate the Chinese New Year on Feb. 18.
“On New Year’s Eve, we will eat all of the good things, chicken, duck--and last--fish,” Uy said. “The fish means we will have more of everything next year.”
Members of the Uy family will stay up as late as possible on New Year’s Eve. “The Chinese believe that the later they stay up, the longer their parents will live,” she said. “So we’re up until 3 or 4 in the morning. And our children get red envelopes with money tucked inside.”
Gala co-chairwoman Arlene Cheng, who founded the Showcase of Young Musicians in 1992, wore jade earrings and a hot-pink Chinese silk dress to the gala. “Usually, brides wear this color,” said Cheng, who was accompanied by her husband, George. “I feel great in it!”
Cheng was born in the Year of the Horse, she said. “I hate to say, because then everyone can figure out how old I am.”
While people born in the Year of the Rat--Sir Winston Churchill and George Washington, among them--are admired for their ambition, people born in the Year of the Horse are known for being hard-working. “And I’m working like crazy,” Cheng said.
Cheng’s dream is to make the showcase a national event. “Right now, it is a statewide competition,” she said. “I’m happy to see that this benefit is becoming very sought-after for Chinese Americans.”
Guests dined on chicken medallions with curry sauce in a ballroom decorated in red and gold. Onstage, where Chanel of South Coast Plaza paraded its Spring/Summer Ready to Wear Collection, twin black vases held sprays of lipstick-red tulips, ginger and Gerbera daisies.
Before dinner, guests enjoyed what emcee Bin Li called “spiritual appetizers”--musical selections performed by internationally acclaimed pianist Xiang-Dong Kong. Thirteen-year-old violinist Eric Liang also entertained guests.
After dessert, guests watched models showcase the latest in casual chic by Karl Lagerfeld--chino pants topped with unstructured jackets in shades of pink, blue, orange, coral, beige and yellow tweed.
A few eyebrows went up when the models swept on stage with nothing but their bare skin showing beneath the buttonless jackets.
“That’s the way Karl wanted it,” said Chanel Vice President Roger Martin, director of the Costa Mesa boutique. “Lagerfeld is telling women to enjoy their clothes--to take your Chanel suit and wear the jacket with chinos or jeans.”
Also among guests was gala co-chairwoman Nancy Weinstein; Chinese-American League President Ellen Ong; symphony board President Ron Hanson with his wife, Joyce; Dorothy and Henry Hwang, parents of playwright David Hwang (author of “M Butterfly”); and Louis Spisto, executive director of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra.
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Johnsons to return: Roger and Janice Johnson will return from Washington to their Laguna Beach home March 1. “The first thing I’ll do is go onto my deck and sit in the sun,” Janice said last week after her husband announced his resignation as chief of the General Services Administration. “We were snow-bound here for a week!”
While Roger works on President Clinton’s reelection campaign--”I’ll be speaking across the country for him,” he said last week--Janice will volunteer in Orange County on behalf of the Pacific Symphony and the AIDS Services Foundation. “And, hopefully, I will continue to work on the Preservation Committee for the White House,” she said.
Janice is organizing a Feb. 13 reception for the Women’s Leadership Forum at the Pacific Club in Newport Beach, where Tipper Gore will speak on mental health.
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New center chairman: Performing Arts Center Chairman Thomas Nielsen passed the baton to Mark Johnson last week during a dinner board meeting at Segerstrom Hall.
“It is exciting, humbling and flattering,” to be elected the new chairman during the center’s 10th anniversary year, said Johnson, who attended with fiancee, Barbara Hiller.
“The first 10 years has been about crystallizing the vision of the founders,” said Johnson, of Tustin. “The next 10 will be about expanding its scope and reaching deeper into the community.” Johnson and Hiller plan to wed in Hastings, England, this spring.
Also enjoying the sit-down dinner under the firebird sculpture was Thomas Kendrick, the center’s first executive director. His anniversary wish for the center: “That, at the end of the next 10 years, a small theater and symphony hall will be operating alongside the center with the success this one is today,” he said.
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Retail treasure hunt: When guests at Thursday night’s party at Glabman’s Furniture in Costa Mesa weren’t searching for prizes among the armoires and banquettes, they were getting the low-down on an upcoming gala--the Symphony of Jewels Ball on April 13 sponsored by the Pacific Symphony at the Hyatt Regency Irvine.
The ball is co-sponsored by Travcoa of Newport Beach and Tiffany & Co. of South Coast Plaza. Up for prizes: luxury getaways to Australia/New Zealand and Cambodia/Vietnam donated by William Dultz of Travcoa. Jo Qualls and Pamela Bobit are co-chairwomen. Information: 714-755-5788.