Mỹ Lai
2022 · Smithsonian Folkways SFW40251 · San Francisco, California
- Artist
- Kronos Quartet
- Title
- Mỹ Lai
- Release
- Mỹ Lai
- Year
- 2022
- Label
- Smithsonian Folkways # SFW40251
- Format
- LP · Album
- Language
- English
- Country
- San Francisco, California, USA
- Songwriter
- Jonathan Berger, Harriet Scott Chessman
- Genre
- Western Classical Music · Chamber Opera
- Primary theme
- Post-War
Annotation
My Lai massacre / Calley. Protest, anti-war. Post-war, 2022 "On March 16, 1968, the United States Army killed over 500 unarmed civilians in the hamlet of Mỹ Lai, Vietnam. The unimaginable brutality of the event impacted all those who witnessed it firsthand, including helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson, who, against orders, intervened to save Vietnamese lives. Thompson’s story is the basis of the opera Mỹ Lai, composed by Jonathan Berger (music) and Harriet Scott Chessman (libretto) for Kronos Quartet, Vietnamese multi-instrumentalist Vân-Ánh Vanessa Võ, and vocalist Rinde Eckert. This definitive recording of Mỹ Lai captures the visceral, phantasmal depictions of Thompson’s grief, horror, and guilt as he is haunted by persistent memories of that cataclysmic day, half a world and nearly four decades away. Tense and unforgiving, Mỹ Lai is “a gripping affair, beginning to end” (New York Times). Presented here alongside recollections by Vietnamese survivor Trần Văn Đức, it is a memorial to all the Mỹ Lai villagers killed on that grim day" (1)
Annotation by Justin A. Brummer
Notes
Chamber opera by Jonathan Berger (music) and Harriet Scott Chessman (libretto) on helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson; premiered Chicago, 29 January 2016; recording released 20 May 2022 as 2LP/CD/digital, with recollections by survivor Trần Văn Đức. Eight tracks: Mỹ Lai Lullaby 7:55; First Landing: Flight 9:37; Descent 7:04; The Ditch 14:14; Second Landing: Hovering 8:29; Bunker 12:32; Third Landing: Postcard 5:16; Fishing 5:39.
About the artist
San Francisco string quartet founded in 1973 by David Harrington (with John Sherba, Hank Dutt and, here, cellist Sunny Yang); over 1,000 commissioned works and 60-plus recordings; joined on this recording by tenor Rinde Eckert and Vietnamese-instrument virtuoso Vân-Ánh Vanessa Võ. [Source: Smithsonian Folkways]