Mountains and Seas – Song of Today is a rare contemporary production that dares to look both backward and forward at once. Drawing from the vast cosmology of ancient Chinese mythology, the piece remoulds these primal stories through a distinctly modern performative language—one that fuses traditional opera techniques with electronic music, physical theatre, and an intricate interplay of light, sound, and projected image. The result is a work that feels mythic yet urgent, ancient yet unmistakably present.

What first strikes the audience is the production’s hybrid sonic world. Traditional operatic timbres—arched vocal lines, ornamented phrasing, the lingering resonance of gong and drum—intertwine with pulses of electronica and manipulated field recordings. This bold fusion never feels decorative; instead, it functions as the dramaturgical backbone of the piece. The score creates a soundscape that is both ritualistic and destabilised, mirroring the show’s overarching tension between the enduring wisdom of myth and the fractured conditions of contemporary life.

Visually, the production is lush without being indulgent. Projected imagery, shadow play, and shifting light textures construct a world that is continuously morphing—sometimes oceanic and fluid, sometimes harsh and barren. These images evoke environments undergoing transformation, echoing the climate anxiety of our current era. The physical vocabulary of the performers, clearly informed by both operatic stylisation and contemporary movement practices, bridges the mythic with the corporeal. Their gestures oscillate between the formal precision of traditional opera and the raw urgency of bodies responding to a world in collapse.

What distinguishes Mountains and Seas – Song of Today is that its mythology is not positioned as escapism. Instead, the production reframes these ancient tales as mirrors for ecological and societal precarity. The mountains and seas of legend—the vast landscapes populated by spirits, creatures, and forgotten gods—become metaphors for the ecosystems we are rapidly losing. The piece consistently asks: What happens when the world of gods and the world of humans decay in tandem? And what myths will be left to tell when the environment can no longer sustain them?

At its strongest moments, the production achieves a sense of ritual rather than narrative. Scenes unfold like fragments of remembered dreams or half-buried cultural memory, inviting the audience to witness rather than interpret. This approach may feel opaque to some viewers, but it is precisely the work’s refusal to flatten mythology into digestible symbolism that gives it its haunting resonance.

Mountains and Seas – Song of Today emerges as a compelling argument for the relevance of myth in a time of environmental crisis. By weaving opera, electronic sound, and sensorial stagecraft into a holistic theatrical organism, the production reanimates ancient cosmologies as tools for contemporary reflection. It is not merely a retelling of old stories, but a warning, a lament, and—most unexpectedly—a gesture of hope.