Tan Dun: Buddha Passion

What is it like to be fully awake? The Buddha, filled with unconditional compassion for all living beings, found the answer while meditating beneath a sacred fig tree. His wise teachings led others to experience nirvana, the extinction of mind-forged suffering, the attainment of enlightenment itself. Tan Dun’s epic Buddha Passion, first performed in 2018, charts the spiritual journey of the young prince who renounces riches to become the Buddha, the “Enlightened One”. It includes key texts from 2,500 years of Buddhist tradition, the exquisite Heart Sutra among them, brought to life in Chinese and Sanskrit by a symphonic chorus, four operatic soloists, traditional musicians and a large orchestra. The work’s world premiere recording, conducted by the composer, leads the listener through scenes from the Buddha’s life to reveal his compassionate philosophy. “I think compassion is a wonderful bridge between animals and human beings, between nature and human beings, and between all kinds of human beings,” Tan Dun tells Apple Music Classical. Buddha Passion, he adds, in its structure and storytelling, was influenced by his study of Johann Sebastian Bach. “I find his music to be very compassionate. Each of the five acts of Buddha Passion, for example, has a chorus to summarise and provide a compassionate conclusion. This I learned from Bach’s St Matthew Passion and St John Passion. I hope the Buddha Passion can bring listeners into this spiritual circle of love, compassion and friendship.” Buddha Passion opens a musical dialogue between East and West. The album’s cosmopolitan cast, embracing the Orchestre National de Lyon, the Internationale Chorakademie, four Chinese operatic soloists and indigenous singers and instrumentalists from the Dunhuang region, was recorded live at Shanghai’s Oriental Art Center Concert Hall. The collaboration of musicians from many nations and backgrounds reflects the central theme of interdependence in the Buddha’s teachings. Dun was inspired to write the work following a visit to the Mogao Caves in China’s Dunhuang region. The vast complex of Buddhist shrines, created between the fourth and 14th centuries CE beside the Silk Road trade route, contains murals of music-making and dance. “These musical paintings show more than 4000 musical instruments, 3000 musicians and 500 orchestras. I sensed the music coming from them and was deeply moved. People ask me where the Buddhist philosophy came from. It came from a very interesting spiritual realm of the universe. I find music is always the best medium to carry that spirit.” The composer learned of the cache of paper manuscripts, including Buddhist chants, that had been entombed in the so-called Library Cave for eight centuries until their discovery in 1900. Many of the Dunhuang documents were sold to Western explorers and deposited in the collections of leading international institutions. Dun visited the British Library’s Manuscripts Reading Room and, with help from Silk Road scholar Susan Whitfield, began deciphering the Mogao manuscripts. “I couldn’t believe that I had a manuscript from the Mogao Caves in front of me. I was in the British Library reading beautiful documents and began transcribing these ancient melodies. I was able to use them in Buddha Passion thanks to all those guardians in Britain who kept those wonderful paper manuscripts in beautiful shape.”