The Vietnamese opera had its origins from China since the Han Dynasty but has transformed into its own with its own folklore and costumes, for example the ao dai as compared to the elaborate costumes of ancient cathay. Whether known as Tuong, Cai Luong or the more plebeian Cheo, this ancient cultural pursuit that has survived in its present form has changed with politics, history and time. No more a court pastime with the collapse of the monarchies of Ly and Nguyen, it suffers from the vagaries of trend and technology and globalisation, and while there will still be dance and song, and poetry too, it would be more perfunctory and abridged. Opera players refer to actors and musicians, and the quadrant insights by Bui Xuan Phai start with the bearded scholar, probably the protagonist. Bui Xuan Phai, though one of the best known of pioneer modernists who hugely impacted Vietnamese art, suffers from political persecution during his lifetime, even losing his teaching job because of his involvement in the 1957 Nhan Van movement. When rehabilitated in 1984, he held his first (and only) solo, and in 1996, was posthumously awarded the coveted Ho Chi Minh Prize, together with his buddy Nguyen Tu Nghiem – two of the Four Pillars of Vietnamese Art. He graduated from the Indo-China Fine Arts College in 1946, together with Nghiem. He was involved in the anti-French resistance in Viet Bac and the August 1954 Revolution in Hanoi. Among other things, he is best known for his paintings of the Old Hanoi quarters, dubbed ‘Po Phai’ (Phai Street).