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OXFORD - Chinese pianist Lang Lang inspired students in Oxford Friday evening with his life story, before playing a short piano piece for the audiences.

The event was held at the Oxford Union Debating Chamber, attracted hundreds of students. The hall became so crowded that many had to stand from the beginning to the end.

Piano prodigy Lang Lang will spend less time touring and more working on charitable and educational projects. Liu Yuhan reports.

The first Chinese New Year Gala Concert in New York City by the New York Philharmonic features Lang Lang and many great Chinese artists will be broadcast on Pheonix Chinese channel on February 4th at 4:00PM and repeated once at 11:45PM.

The New York Philharmonic will celebrate the Year of the Dragon by performing Chinese music with pianist Lang Lang, special guest choir Quintessenso and the conductor Long Yu.

The program includes composer Bao Yuankai's China Air Suite, Li Huanzhi's Spring Festival Overture and Extase for oboe and orchestra by composer Chen Qigang, who composed the Beijing Olympic Games theme song, You and Me.

Lang Lang, the renowned Chinese pianist, is celebrating the Year of the Dragon with two concerts in New York, both broadcast live on the Web site of WQXR, the New York classical music station.

In the first, to be broadcast at 6 p.m. EST January 23, Mr. Lang will perform traditional songs and Chinese New Year favorites with Quintessenso, a chorus of children age 5 to 12 from Mongolia, in northeastern China, in its first appearance outside of China.

More images from the event can be viewed here: http://www.langlang.com/us/photos/site-galleries/nasdaq-event

The superstar pianist Lang Lang may shamelessly cultivate a flamboyant persona. And he has been criticized widely for exaggerated expressivity. Still, no fair-minded person can deny that Mr. Lang has stupendous technique and keen musical instincts.

On Friday, January 20th, 2012 (from 9:15 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. ET) The Chinese Consul General will visit the NASDAQ MarketSite in New York City’s Times Square in celebration of Chinese New Year, the year of the Dragon.

In honor of the occasion, Consul General Guoxiang Sun and Pianist Lang Lang will ring the Opening Bell.

A live webcast of the NASDAQ Opening Bell will be available at: http://social.nasdaqomx.com

New York’s flagship orchestra maps out a busy week with multiple agendas. The main event is a program with the world’s most popular pianist, Lang Lang; he collaborates with Alan Gilbert and the ensemble in Bartók’s incisive Second Piano Concerto, the centerpiece of a program bookended by two colorful and propulsive works, Magnus Lindberg’s “Feria” and Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5 in B-Flat Major. (Jan. 18-19 at 7:30 and Jan. 20-21 at 8.) | Lang Lang is not only a piano phenom but also a celebrity ambassador representing a country with a booming classical-music culture.