A O Show – for Outburst of Emotions

When night falls on Ho Chi Minh City, different crowds of people look for different entertainment services, and A O Shows can bring about outburst of emotions for the audience. The light from the municipal Theater of Ho Chi Minh city welcomed us and those who are interested in that special kind of performance called A O (Ah Oh) Show. Not only its special name but also a huge basket hung at the front hall really aroused curiosity. Enjoying a A O Show is a must-do experience in any tour in Ho Chi Minh to discover the city by night.

Rural Features inside the City

When entering the main hall, we were even more surprised at the arrangements on the stage. It was not magnificent or colorful. Instead, there was only a black background, flattering the yellow bamboo baskets of different sizes arranged in an eye-catch way.At 18:00 sharp, the lights all went out, and the beautiful music in the darkness took the audience to the simple features in the Vietnamese rural villages, where the villagers lead simple but very happy lives.

At a place, a girl in the Vietnamese traditional blouse suit called “bà ba” walked over a bamboo bridge, singing a folk song while carrying a basket of rice on her head. What a beautiful and peaceful scene!

The young men, with their strong hands, took control of nature and cultivated land to produce food or caught fish for their families.

The A O Show also displayed a lively picture of the countryside with common animals like frogs and crabs. Then, suddenly that setting of the peaceful rural scene became urbanized; and people were still happy but the pace of living was faster with the hustle and bustle of the city life.

A O Show can be said to be a puzzle picture made up of different pieces of the everyday life of the people living on the Southern and Central coastal areas and in the Mekong Delta region.

With the great passion for and skills in arts, the choreographer made excellent preparations for the show with mainly bamboo pieces which were very simple but very impressive. The actors, actresses, music and lights were all wonderfully combined to create a picture of typical Vietnamese life. Officially launched on stage for the first time on the 15th of February, 2013, A O Show has been considered a program that has gone out of the boring conventional style and breathed new life into the arts on stage.

It is a great combination of the arts of dancing, circus and opera on the background of folk music with more than 17 traditional musical instruments popular around the country. 

What is more special is that these musical instruments were directly played by more than five professional musicians, increasing the interactions and liveliness of the performances. The performers had been carefully selected out of more than 100 excellent candidates from professional circus groups, dance groups and athletic. They have a great passion for arts and enthusiastically show their performances. It is easy to see a burning desire to display great performances and convey the good ideas of the shows to the audiences. Their performances indicate that the actors and actresses have made good use of their strengths to successfully play their roles to create a significant colorful picture of life.

Those who want a ticket to return to childhood can certainly find one on the journey called A O Show. Come and feel the great performances and experience the great emotions first hand.