The Booklet says it all!
News
New Album “Beyond Borders”
New album Released February 3rd 2017
Music is Life. Since the origins of mankind, it has accompanied humanity through all its stages of evolution. It has always played an important part in spiritual ceremonies, rituals, celebrations, entertainment. But most of all, Music allows people from different nations, origins, backgrounds to reach out to one another. I have had the immense fortune to have been brought up in a bi-cultural background. My musical training since childhood was shared between the apprenticeship of western classical piano and ancestral traditional Vietnamese music through the Vietnamese Zither, the đàn tranh. This has allowed me to transcend “ borders” that frequently restrain different musical universes from merging. In my debut album Consonnances, I brought together the Vietnamese Zither and a classical string quartet. My second recording A Journey Between Worlds blended in the zither and the oriental Oud and percussion. But I still wanted to explore more. I wanted to reach out even further in my quest to bring music from all parts of the world together. My task was to bring vietnamese ancestral music to the encounter of instruments and traditions from other continents, while at the same time respecting the authenticity of each, in spirit or in form. In Beyond Borders, my greatest joy is to have been able to collaborate with outstanding musicians from Africa to America, from Europe to Asia. It is the continuation of my musical journeys, and I pray this will bring people of all nations together, to the understanding and mutual respect of each respective culture. I believe that Music brings peace to the soul, as it does to mankind.
New Ep
About the EP : A Journey Between Worlds
A musical odyssey from the Mekong to the Mediterranean
On my first album, “Consonnances” I attempted to bring together two of the world’s great musical traditions: the western string quartet and the Vietnamese zither; two tradictions that have spanned the centuries.
For my nex recording “A Journey Between Worlds”, I am joined by the extraordinary oud player QaÏs Saadi. In doing so, i am bringing together two musical styles that have never met before! Just as in “Consonnances”, I have set out to create a new type of music, fuding vietnamese instruments and melodies and modes with foreign musical styles. I am doing this because of my own bi-cultural upbringing – and because I want people to know about Vietnamese music! Not just as a museum piece or something to be heard at ethnic festivals, but a living music that people can feel, and identify with regardless of frontiers, borders, nationality or race. So what better way to accomplish this than with meeting and performing with musicians from different cultures? I hope my musical journey will encourage others to open their ears and hearts and experience the beauty that is possible when strangers become friends through the sacred act of making music.
All the songs on this EP have been inspired by authentic, traditional Vietnamese music, but have been recomposed, recreated and expanded, while retaining the spirit and structure of the original melodies.