FULL What the Horse Eats (PQ Phan) Bloomington IN 2021 DuPont Arreola Vân Nguyễn Martinez
MORE VIDEO FILES: VIDEO, VIDEO, VIDEO
Information on the Performance
- Work Title: What the Horse Eats
- Composer: PQ Phan
- Libretto: Anvi Hoàng, PQ Phan Libretto Text, Libretto Index
- Venue & Opera Company: Buskirk-Chumley Theater, Bloomington, Indiana, Indiana University, Jacobs School of Music
- Recorded: August 21, 2021
- Type: Staged Opera Live
- Singers: Carl DuPont, Brian Arreola, Bích Vân Nguyễn, Alejandra Martinez, Skyler Schlenker, Subin Bae, Bryce Carson
- Conductor: Henry Hao-An Cheng
- Orchestra: Instrumental Ensemble
Information about the Recording
- Published by: Jacobs School of Music
- Date Published: 2021
- Format: Streaming
- Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
- Subtitles: yessubs, ensubs
- Video Recording from: YouTube FULL VIDEO
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE
Making something appalling into something ravishing requires skill. Audiences will learn a bit of Asian history next month during a new one-hour chamber opera.
There’s a relationship between composer and audience; those who see “What the Horse Eats” will learn something about its composer, director and co-librettist.
P.Q. Phan, professor of music composition at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, has come up with a chamber (short with only a few musical instruments, in this case eight) opera about Vietnam in 1945. World War II is moments from ending.
“We’re not there to say who’s wrong or right,” Phan said. (His wife, author Anvi Hoang, co-wrote the libretto with him.)
Three lead singers and two chorus members (villagers) tell Phan’s story, based on actual events, of a Vietnamese man demoted to a position of tending a Japanese man’s adored white horse.
Japanese fighters had come to Vietnam in September 1940, staying until the war ended in August 1945. For most of this time, French colonialists kept control of the area, but the Japanese took over in 1945. Japanese forces occupying Vietnam empowered the Viet Minh, a resistance group founded by H? Chí Minh.
“Since only emperors were permitted to ride white horses, the opera’s horse being white is significant,” Phan said. Hakida (Carl DuPont) is a Japanese captain who is now losing the war. He owns the horse and is trying to elevate himself to the status of emperor. The horse represents to Hakida what he, himself, aspires to; dignity and bravery. And victory.
“What the Horse Eats” is about what people do to one another. How we torture. How we love and sacrifice, too. How we parent. How we decide. The horse tender, Hùng (Brian Arreola) is a loose reflection of Phan’s father’s personality. Hùng is protective over his wife, Mai (Bich Van Nguyen), and their newly born son. The baby, for lack of food crops, is starving to death. Products such as hemp and castor oil seed were being grown in their place, plus rice was diverted to the Japanese occupiers. The great famine of 1944-45 climaxed in the spring of 1945 in Japanese-occupied northern Vietnam.
A provocative story among an emperor want-to-be and his white horse, a horse-tender, his wife and a new-born child. How far would one go to defend one’s honor? How far would one go for the survival of one’s child? Based on a true event, you will be shocked but moved by this 60-minute chamber opera. Composer: PQ Phan. Libretto by: Anvi HoaÌng & PQ Phan