To commemorate the 80^th anniversary of the victory in the Chinese People’s War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascism War, the NCPA proudly presents the ethnic opera commission The Red Sorghum, set for its world premiere from September 27^th to October 3^rd. The opera, scripted by Nobel laureate MO Yan and composed by renowned composer GUO Wenjing, will move audiences with stirring music, leading them through time and space to hear the fiery cries from the sorghum field and sing the heroic battle anthem written by Chinese people.

Published in 1986, MO Yan’s novel Red Sorghum Clan is set in Gaomi Township, Shandong Province during the War of Resistance Against Japan. It tells the legendary stories of villagers like DAI Fenglian and YU Zhan’ao, revealing human struggles in the old society and the awakening and resistance of ordinary people during national crisis. Since its publication, the novel has been adapted into the film, TV dramas, dance drama, drama, and Peking Opera. The NCPA has assembled a “golden lineup” creative team to bring this beloved classic to the opera stage for the first time. As both the original author and opera librettist, MO Yan personally rewrote the drama rather than simply authorizing an adaptation, focusing the main plot on four characters—Jiu’er, YU Zhan’ao, LUO Han, and Fengxian—interweaving their love-hate entanglements with the War of Resistance Against Japan narrative. These ordinary rural people, despite their distinctive personal flaws and limits shaped in their era, embody patriotic spirit that “the fate of the nation is everyone’s responsibility” through their simplest actions.

In the opera The Red Sorghum, MO Yan’s librettos combine rural flavour with literary elegance. Composer GUO Wenjing, during his field research in Shandong, gathered extensive local mterials including regional operas, storytelling, and folk songs and dances. His composition incorporates local style such as Mao Tune, Liu Tune, Shandong Bangzi Opera, Shandong clapper ballads, Jiaozhou yangko, and Gaomi folk songs. Traditional Chinese instruments like suona and banhu are added to the orchestra. GAO skillfully integrates the operas regional and ethnic characteristics with grand opera techniques, creating a musical language that is both symphonic and dramatic, aiming to establish a new model of modern ethnic opera with distinctly Chinese style, aesthetics, and grandeur.