The year 2020 will mark the 20-year anniversary of the release of my first album, DALAMA: ‘the end’n is just the beginnin’.

When I recorded DALAMA, I didn’t have a studio, a mixing board, or any fancy equipment. All I had were my stories — about my family, about the genocide in Cambodia, about our experiences as refugees in the U.S. – and a compelling desire to share them, to provide a glimpse into what our lives were like.

Many things have changed over the past 20 years, not only for me but for the diasporic Cambodian community, and yet one thing we all retain is our identity as Khmer. We struggle with it. We fight with it. We defend it. We embrace it. And now, twenty years later, I will be performing a show to commemorate it.

For this performance I am selecting songs from throughout my DALAMA trilogy (hence the broader title of the series, the DALAMA Chronicles), each reflecting different steps and phases along my life path, echoing myriad memories, dreams, and realities. As such, each composition will take you on a musical journey, from Cambodia to America, from past to present, exploring themes of war, suffering, resilience, and recovery, told through various musical forms – from rap and hip-hop to traditional ayai and phleng Khmer. The show will also include video projected on a movie screen, and feature several special guests.

It has been some time since I have performed for the Long Beach community, and so this show represents a one-of-a-kind opportunity to see me on stage in the place I was made to/came to call home.