The continent-wide cultural collision carrying in the new year

On the eve of Feb. 13, students, families, celebrants, as well as those who generally appreciate the opportunity for a holiday trickled in to fill BAHT’s 1,200 seat auditorium in anticipation of the night’s spectacle. Nineteen groups were set to perform works from across Asia, including the “Arabian” dance, “Coffee,” from “The Nutcracker”; a dance of young girls riding horses to represent the incoming Year of the Horse; and a fashion show flaunting Vietnamese Áo dài, Indian saris and Chinese Tang shirts. Everything came together in a grand celebration of Lunar New Year.  

As the ceiling lights dimmed and projecting beams pierced the air, four main hosts took the stage: Frank Wang, Kati MC, Sabrina Yang and the most notable among the four, Slater Rhea. Making his career as the so-called “Musical Diplomat” between China and the U.S., he provided a steady stream of jokes through the welcoming ceremony and during breaks between acts. All of it would’ve surely been amusing for myself and my plus one, the photographer for this article, except that a majority of it was in Mandarin. The crowd didn’t seem to mind, though, as they laughed along with Rhea and the other hosts. For those that didn’t understand the language like me, we simply laughed because of the infectious energy of the crowd. 

What came to a surprise to me, however, was just how many countries besides China celebrate Lunar New Year: from India to South Korea and Mongolia, all of these countries and more were represented within the night’s program. A local dance company, DashAvatar Dance Academy, held a sattriya, a dance telling a 500-year-old Hindu story with a theme of spiritual transformation; Siew-Lee Chin, an opera singer, performed “The Night in Ulaanbaatar” with lyrics rooted in the ringing in of the new year in Mongolia’s capital and largest city; and in the fashion show, women wearing traditional South Korean hanboks were seen. 

The show’s magic came from how different each segment was compared to its counterparts. Two dancers captivated the audience with their ability to quickly change their face masks in the art of Chinese bian lian, where they would hide their faces behind a fan, and within a second, their mask showing a happy face would change into a face resembling the devil. Each mask changed into something new: a blue mask with a crying face into white mask with a powdered woman’s face into a purple one with a screaming man’s face — it was insane in all the best ways. After this, the audience would be entranced by a lower-dosed version of a light show or rave, performed by tens of 40–50-year-olds waving around flashlights. Then immediately after, a champion in Chinese singing, Scott Huang, would sing a song in a very demure setting, completely opposite to the two groups before him. There were zero dull moments in this festival with its cultural exposition and exposure. 

While all 19 groups entertained, some acts stuck with the audience long after the show had ended. Sixth in presenting order was a young-adult female group called Dance Code performing “We Go Up” by BABYMONSTER, where they mirrored all of the aspects of a K-pop girl-group that I’ve grown to love: high-fashion street-style clothing, dancing with sharp arm movements and, of course, a banger beat in the background. While it was not particularly related to Lunar New Year, it was definitely worth the watch. 

No. 17 in the lineup was a saxophone quartet performing “Passionate Continent,” with one lead saxist playing notes that I would only hear in swing music. The notes were energetic and evoked some in the audience to start clapping to the rhythm. Finally, at No. 19, Rhea himself took the stage to sing “The Sky Calls & Father’s Prairie.” I understood as to why he was so famous in China — he was a Louisianian singing in perfect Chinese. I was shocked as to what I was seeing; when he spoke English the few times on stage, he sounded like a normal American and even had a Southern accent, but when he sang, it was like his voice adopted an accent that confused my brain into thinking he was lip-syncing, which he clearly wasn’t.  

Since it was now the Year of the Horse per the Chinese zodiac, horse elements were present throughout the showcase. Beyond the dance troupe of young girls, YES Orchestra presented “Horse Racing,” where they translated the sounds of running horses into stringed instruments. Over 20 performers plucked strings and created vibrato songs panting a scene where dashing horses had entered the audience. 

The festival showcased a lot of the stereotypical aspects of Lunar New Year that I, a non-Asian person, know such as red lanterns, the pipa instrument, and discussing what the animal of the year represents. But overwhelmingly, it showed me what I had never experienced: Chinese folk music, face changing, new instruments like the harp-like guzheng, the mixing of ballet with martial arts, the non-East Asian cultures that celebrate the holiday and more.  

This was definitely something not to miss, and its impacts extend beyond the auditorium’s walls. The West’s incomprehensible opposition towards the East and its cultures is dying and with that, our access as Americans to the cultures shared by billions of people is becoming exponentially more accessible. I’ve always wanted to know what I was missing out on and after this festival, I’ve scraped the surface of the magic that is currently happening on the other side of the world.