The Gustaf Sjokvist Chamber Choir of Sweden will perform along with Vietnamese artists at the concert.
The 33-member choir will open the night with a sequence of contemporary Swedish compositions.
The highlighted work will be Forkladd Gud (A God Disguised) suite composed in 1940 by Swedish composer Lars-Erik Larsson to lyrics by Swedish writer and poet Hjalmar Gullberg.
The lyrics are from Gullberg’s collection of poems Kärlek i tjugonde seklet (Love in the 20th Century) from 1933, based on a motif from Greek mythology where the god Apollo appears as a human for a year to serve as a farm labourer for King Admetus in the Greek region of Thessaly.
The composition includes parts for solo soprano and solo baritone, featuring Eva Casserstedt and Ulf Hedbjörk from the choir.
The narration will be translated into Vietnamese and spoken by theatrical director and actor Thai Kim Tung.
The concert will include extracts from the Vietnamese folk suite Dong Chay (The Flow) composed by Tran Manh Hung.
The night will end with Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in 1824.
The concert will feature the orchestra and chorus from the Ho Chi Minh City Ballet Symphony Orchestra and Opera (HBSO).
It will be conducted by Florian Benfer, the choir’s artistic leader since 2018, and Tran Nhat Minh of HBSO.
The Gustav Sjokvist Chamber Choir was founded by Gustav Sjokvist in Stockholm in 1994. Sjokvist died in 2015.
