“There was never a road, but when many people walk on it, the road comes into existence.” (Lu Xun)
Just a few minutes into a musical, you can already learn almost everything you need to know about the story that will unfold in the next two hours — meet the opening number. Although if you are like me and listening comprehension isn’t your best language skill, it’s a must to look into the lyrics again. For the grand openings of January Sun Acts 1 and 2 — Blink Of An Eye and Inside And Out — it might as well be compulsory to lyrically analyze them in order to comprehend what is foreshadowed.
At a glance, Blink Of An Eye fulfills its place as an introduction: it guides us through the pub that our protagonist January runs, her regulars and dearest friends, as well as sets a cheerful atmosphere with a major key, full of anticipation for changes yet to come. It paints a picture of a small town moving forward, centering the citizens of the working class and putting the uptown residents upstage. This doesn’t come as a surprise, not only due to the fact that our protagonist is a dear member of the working class, but also as the story unfolds, we will come to learn that she is tied to the safe corner of Sunday Pub both physically and mentally with the people of her own class.
Greeted immediately by a grandiose opening performance, the audience is likely to overlook the clues here and there that hint at the much more complex conflicts in Sol Town — more than the simple class segregation. The opening number is set in the most ordinary situation — working people getting ready for a new day — and seemingly leaves us with little to question. Yet the lines approaching the chorus beg to differ:
“The rhythm of life
As time passing by
Keeps me alive”
“The rhythm of life
As time passing by
Keeps her alive”
As the melody ascends but the harmony dims into a minor chord, we are given a hint of the core energy driving this town. What pushes these folks to continue waking up and greeting the sun isn’t an innate sense of purpose, but rather a naturally progressing force that they have little control over: the rhythm of life, the time passing by. And our main character is no exception, if not to underline this aspect as her utmost crisis.
After the intermission, we are welcomed back to Sol with a similar composition: a contradiction between the rosy sounds and the underlying uncertainty in the lyrics of Inside And Out.
If Blink Of An Eye opens with the seemingly friendly and hopeful members of the working class, and blurs out the disheartening office workers in the back; ‘Inside And Out’ reverses our attention to the hustle of the upper class and creates another illusion of optimism via an upbeat melody before rushing into more and more anxiety: Welcome to Act 2! From “Walking down the street” to “Working hard and keeping our chin up”; “Ready to hit the road” to “Life downtown is quite a scheme” — it is yet again a predetermined motive sending diligent workers on the road:
“The ray of sun
It waits for no one
24 hours are not enough
But what maybe
We still keep running
Against the clock”
The moment we thought the song was all about the vanity of the bourgeoisie, it transcends into a much darker parallel space enveloping Olivia Robin — the Editor-in-chief of The Kaloscope, and January Sun — owner of Sunday Pub. At the tail of Inside And Out — No More — they sing about absence: the physical absence of friendly faces around them and the absence of a true purpose that their hearts long for. Throughout the entire musical, this is the only time we see a vulnerable emotional connection between the two classes, represented by the mirroring feelings of two opposing images: a high-born reputable woman with an empire in her hands and an orphan girl trying to preserve her parents’ legacy.
The opening numbers reflect the ponderings that January Sun the musical tries to untangle on both a societal and a personal level. Sol Town is made up of patterns, of the roads that predecessors have carved deep into every corner, setting a solid structure of roles and expectations unlikely to be broken. The constant pressure of fulfilment and success comes in pair with the sole purpose of affording a peaceful life. And as defining as class segregation is in this town, the citizens of upper and working classes alike are all striving despite their different sources of hardship. The musical numbers introducing the two acts are arranged to portray these exact existences — parallel worlds so distant yet so close.
There is the repetition of lines in both opening numbers’ bridges, harmonized by all citizens of Sol. It isn’t a direct share of emotions as in No More but rather professes a longing that everyone yearns for and doesn’t know how to acquire:
“So far away
The sky and the sound you
Dream to make
Dream to live”
In reality, it cannot be brushed aside how a world in which every single person achieves what their heart truly desires is simply impossible. Knowing that it is beyond our reach, one may question why we even try so hard? But is it worthy of a reason to stop anyone from dreaming and pursuing?
Perhaps it is not a utopia that we are yearning for, but rather the road towards this more compassionate world itself, where we are at least allowed to explore ourselves as individuals and not solely as inheritors of the patterns passed down. Because sometimes, it is not the world out there stopping us from finding a way, but it is the fears and presumptions that we trust more than ourselves keeping us from the streets. Because the only way to shorten the distance is to start the journey.
We are not even halfway there, and Sol Town alike is still figuring out its new decade. But just like that, the openings accomplish their missions as igniters, opening doors to even more interpretations and speculations.