performance art

The Highs and Lows of Vietnamese Opera

The Highs and Lows of Vietnamese Opera

There’s a part of Vietnamese performance art that is distinctly emotional -- melodramatic, you might even call it. Actually, we call it cải lương. It’s folk opera that amplifies human drama with plaintive notes and a haunting pitch. This week, Lilly Nguyễn goes back in time to her first musical memory of cải lương to discover the story behind this traditional musical theater.