It was about three years ago that Muna Tseng and Tan Dun first started talking about paper. Tan, who emigrated from China to New York in 1986 to pursue a doctorate in composition, had been experimenting with creating sounds from unlikely natural materials; Tseng, a Hong Kong native who’s been part of the east-coast dance scene since the late 70s, was moving toward conveying “tactile sensations” in her choreography. In fact, Tseng recalls, “both of us had just emerged from our “water’ phase. Tan had presented his Water Music right around the time I came up with my Water Mysteries. We met, and he said he had been thinking about papers. Paper costumes, paper sets. The sensations of sounds linked to paper.”
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Tan remembers playing with paper as a child in rural Hunan. “It was so much fun creating noises with an everyday object that cost next to nothing.” While studying at Columbia University he followed the orthodox route of composing orchestral music in Western idioms, but his heritage beckoned. “The ancient Chinese grouped instruments according to their natural sources–earth, water, and so forth,” he says. Five years ago he gave a concert devoted to ceramic folk instruments; then came Water Music, which used jars of water to create sounds. Not one of those traditional elements, paper nevertheless followed.
Tan finished the first leg of the collaboration, coming up with a draft of a score filled with “notes, graphics, and chant words.” Tseng then worked out a choreography to match the paper sound collage, which requires the participation of the dancers. “It’s not improvisational,” she emphasizes. “The movements are structured, and the whole piece has a fluid narrative logic.” Still, it’s more a mood piece than a dramatization of the book; only students of the novel are likely to detect its protagonists.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photos/Peter Barreras, Ringo Chan.
