Work: Dark Passages

Music composed by Miya Masaoka, Libretto by Thulani Davis, Directed by Ellen Chang. A multimedia oratorio with readers, actual activists and resistors, string quartet, Buddhist chanters, actors, projected slides, video. Ruminations on Japanese American concentration camp survivors and WW II wtih Buddhist chanters, live ensemble, video and still projections, archival footage and actors/readers.  Dar Passages endeavors to tell the stroy of a country incarcerating its own population-through the often overlooked story of the Crystal City camp, juxtaposed with the paradoxical situation of the famed  all Japanese American 442nd combat team.  The original score incorporates text from the congressional hearings on redress, testaments from Japanese Peruvians, jailed war resisters and examples of racist hysteria in the media…an epic tale of war, racism, paradox and dharma.