Programs
Del Sol and the Singing Sergeants at the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art in D.C. in May 2023
Angel Island
Between 1910 and 1940, as new immigrants flowed through the immigration station on Angel Island inside the San Francisco Bay, Chinese immigrants faced massive discrimination because of America’s earliest racist immigration legislation – the Chinese Exclusion Act. Being held for sometimes up to years in brutal conditions, many of these immigrants looked for solace by inscribing poetry onto the walls of the center.
We are presenting three ways of telling the story of Angel Island.
Huang Ruo’s Angel Island - Oratorio with string quartet and chamber Choir
String quartet-only movements of Huang Ruo’s Angel Island - Oratorio interspersed with music by Asian-American composers
Theatrical production by Beth Morrison and Prototype Festival (click here for more info)
Del Sol, Alam Khan, Arjun Verma, and Nilan Chaudhuri at the Presidio Theater in October 2023
The Resonance Between
Energy, clarity and virtuosity connect across traditions. Any doubt about this was dispelled by whoops of approval from the full-house audiences on both nights of the San Francisco premiere. This collaborative project creates a contemporary musical synergy that speaks to North Indian musical connoisseurs and neophytes alike.
Alam Khan is the grandson of Allauddin Khan, the music legend who trained India's 20th century cultural ambassadors Ali Akbar Khan and Ravi Shankar, both revered for their astonishing classical virtuosity as well as for their visionary east-west collaborations.
Performers: Del Sol Quartet, sarodist Alam Khan, sitarist Arjun Verma, and tablaist (tba)
Songs of the Diaspora (premiering in June 2025)
Told in the voices of mothers and daughters, across continents and generations, San Francisco first Asian American poet-laureate Genny Lim’s words anchor this multimedia performance with new music by Chinese-diaspora composers in the U.S. Theresa Wong, Vivian Fung and Meilina Tsui.
This is a modular program and can be modified to the needs of the presenter and venue. Click below to learn more.
A live performance in 2018 in celebration of the composer's induction into the American Academy of Arts and Letters
Music for Bringing People Together
From the comfort of community to the screaming pain of loss, this music leads us towards common ground by fully engaging our intellect and imagination. The experience is both radical and familiar. The homespun invention of Ben Johnston’s “Amazing Grace” is paired with Chinary Ung’s visceral “Spiral X.” As one listener told us, “I was asking myself how I should respond to this music - then I realized I was crying.”
This is a string quartet-only program.
Recorded in October 2020 at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco
Dust In Time
Like a Tibetan sand mandala, Huang Ruo’s A Dust in Time grows from the central essence-point of silence towards the colored fullness of ecstasy before returning to its source. The music offers a pathway to ever-expanding possibilities. We’ve shared this experience in a wide variety of settings - from a sandbank in the Yampa River to an art exhibit at the Smithsonian. Originally a one hour cycle, the piece can also be performed in 30 minute or 90 minute versions.
This is a string quartet-only program