Vietnamese Music: Need more imagination and soaring souls

I clicked on the link my brother sent me - Hanoi Waltz by Nguyen Xinh Xo. It turned out to be an old name! It had been a long time since I had seen him, since the early days of Vietnamese Songs with the song Wall Clock.

Hanoi Waltz by Nguyen Xinh Xo

PHOTO: NVCC

In the Vietnamese music scene, Nguyen Xinh Xo, in my opinion (though I have never met him), is a Hanoian boy who seems calm and humble. The humility of a Hanoian whose memories of the subsidy period are deeply imprinted, despite all the hardships, those peaceful days have nurtured a soul that soars with the imaginative world of music . Right from the time of Vietnamese Songs - around 2006, I was quite impressed with his Wall Clock, because of his contemporary musical thinking and themes that transcended love and daily trivialities to question the larger world of life, through the world of electronic sounds.

Indeed, listening to the album's 6 tracks in one go, except for Hanoi Waltz , a 3/4 time track with a melody reminiscent of Ca Tru in a gentle space with soft synthesizers, the remaining tracks are mostly made up of Euclidean rhythms arranged by a modular synthesizer. The harmony and melody are truly refined, without any extra tones, along with the moderate background beat, creating a feeling of drifting into the floating memories within us. A truly beautiful memory with the other side of the floor of a subsidy-era apartment building, the northeast monsoon winds blowing in, the dawn on the surface of Hoan Kiem Lake...

I know Nguyen Xinh Xo has put a lot of effort into these tracks, staying true to the sounds of analog modulars, filter knobs, hardware knobs, and combining them without relying on the world of virtual instruments. The reward for this hard work is the warmth, softness, and emotional quality of the music of Hanoi Waltz , which at times reminds me of the cosmic music of Jean-Michel Jarre.

Listening to music by Jean-Michel Jarre, Vangelis..., I imagine I'm flying in the vast universe, on a ship to the stars.

PHOTO: NVCC

Since I was a high school student, I have been fascinated by the masters of electronic music such as Jean-Michel Jarre, Vangelis... Listening to their music, I imagined myself flying in the vast universe, on a ship to the stars. I realized that Vietnamese music has too few musicians dedicated to this genre, so I appreciate Nguyen Xinh Xo's album Hanoi Waltz even more.

With current Vietnamese music, ballads and thoughts about real life are necessary! But it is the imagination and the soaring of the soul that can poeticize real experiences, help us move forward, and make life less dry.

- "In your opinion, why does current Vietnamese music lack imagination and spiritual inspiration?", I asked my younger brother.

- In my observation, it is the dependence on TikTok, Facebook, and short, quick content that has an impact. Literature is the foundation of everything, but is almost abandoned and neglected. With such influences, songwriters now prefer to speak directly and directly, lacking imagination and imagination.

- Maybe learning and education are not attractive enough to stimulate students to love literature, combined with the world of short and quick content surrounding them?

- Maybe that's also a big reason, brother...

Truly, Vietnamese music is lacking in imaginative music. That world must originate from the evenings of children, when their parents read to them the story of The Little Prince, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea… before the child falls into sweet dreams.

In this era of technology and AI, you have everything at your fingertips, from a symphony orchestra, a pop band, a synthesizer modular system, the world of virtual instruments, and even an AI assistant. But all of these are just tools! How to make good music? What we always lack is emotion, imagination, and a soaring soul - like Nguyen Xinh Xo's Hanoi Waltz, a truly soaring and imaginative album in these hot March days.

Thanhnien.vn

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/nhac-viet-can-them-tri-tuong-tuong-cung-nhung-tam-hon-bay-bong-18525031020323559.htm