Vuvuzela breaks through cultural border

The Opera, entitled The Red Heifer tells the story of a murder in Northern Hungary that is blamed on a Jewish community.

Conducted by Ivan Fischer of the Budapest Festival Orchestra, the opera is making waves more for the way it addresses prejudice and the rising tide of anti-Semitism in Hungary than for its use of the vuvuzela.

The instrument features in the show in a scene where a red papier-mâché cow stomps on a peasant girl’s foot. This sparks scenes of lively folk dancing by a crowd that later turns into soccer hooligans blowing vuvuzelas, waving Hungarian flags and calling for retribution against the Jews.

This is not the first time that the vuvuzela has been used as an instrument of protest. In 2010 the football trumpet was used by protesters who converged on BP’s London headquarters to protest the company’s handling of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

-Teamtalk Media