date
July 07, 2024
closed
location
hồ chí minh
program
MoTsound
about
7 PM - 10 PM
Floor 6, Amanaki Thảo Điền Hotel, 10 Nguyễn Đăng Giai, Thảo Điền, Thủ Đức, Sài Gòn
Artists:
Hoài Anh (Vietnamese based in Ha Noi)
Annie Thảo Phan ((Vietnamese based in Ha Noi))
Ken Ueno (Vietnamese American)
Arnont Nongyao (Thai based in HCMC)
Ses 1: OUT OF A LANDSCAPE – INTO A MINDSCAPE
Backing track & VN Zither: Hoài AnhDance
performance: Annie Thảo Phan
duration: 20 minutes
Statement:
There is no mountain peak higher than the H’Mong people's knees
Fish that live in water
Birds flying in the sky
H’Mong people live in the mountains
Live in the rock, die in the rock
The Northern hills and mountains are home to many ethnic minorities, in which the development of the H’Mong ethnic community is a special existence, representing the ability to adapt perfectly to survive and thrive. .
The H’Mong people choose to live on high mountain peaks, choosing to adapt as best they can to the harsh geographical and climatic conditions, to cling to the roots, to survive and to continue to pass on precious cultural values. million years. Most importantly, they choose "the path of Happiness”.
Among the hundreds of thousands of differences between peoples, regions, countries or continents, each of us can share one similarity: learning to adapt to life and foreign languages. scene, to find Happiness.
What is happiness? That happiness is exchanged for what? By staying silent, turning a blind eye, turning away from scandalous things? Because of the click of the tongue and the contentment to fold one's arms? Or at the cost of long-term struggles, persistent voices and actions? By freedom? Or do we have to be free to have Happiness? It could be one, and it could be all of the above aspects, and more. Happiness is in the mind, the mind is liberated, the heart can be at peace.
As the name of the work suggests, Out of a landscape – Into a Mind'scape is a journey that transcends all limits: taking you from the majestic natural landscape, mixed with simple daily life, deep into the world. the inner depths of the artist, as well as yourself. Self-discovery, self-assess your own inner world, to find a way to reach out from those measurements, patterns, and constraints and find a peaceful place.
Original statement:
Không có đỉnh núi nào cao hơn đầu gối người Mông
Loài cá sống ở nước
Loài chim bay trên trời
Người Mông sống ở núi
Sống trong đá, chết nằm trong đá
Đồi núi phía Bắc là nơi cư trú của rất nhiều dân tộc thiểu số, trong đó sự phát triển của cộng đồng dân tộc Mông là một sự tồn tại đặc biệt, đại diện cho khả năng thích nghi hoàn hảo để sinh tồn và vươn lên.
Người Mông chọn sống trên những đỉnh núi cao vời vợi, chọn cách thích nghi hết sức mình với hoàn cảnh địa lý và khí hậu khắc nghiệt, để bám trụ, để sinh tồn và để tiếp tục truyền dưỡng những giá trị văn hoá quý giá ngàn đời. Quan trọng hơn cả, họ chọn “con đường Hạnh phúc”.
Trong hàng trăm ngàn điểm khác biệt giữa các dân tộc, giữa các vùng miền, các quốc gia hay châu lục, mỗi người chúng ta đều có thể cùng chia sẻ chung một điểm tương đồng: học cách thích nghi với cuộc sống, với ngoại cảnh, để hướng tìm về Hạnh phúc.
Hạnh phúc là gì? Hạnh phúc đó được đánh đổi bởi những gì? Bởi sự làm thinh, làm ngơ, quay lưng khỏi những điều chướng tai gai mắt? Bởi cái tặc lưỡi, bằng lòng khoanh tay? Hay đánh đổi bằng những đấu tranh lâu dài, bởi tiếng nói và hành động bền bỉ? Bằng sự tự do? Hay phải tự do mới có được Hạnh phúc? Có thể là một, và cũng có thể là tất cả những khía cạnh trên, và hơn thế nữa. Hạnh phúc ở trong tâm, tâm trí được giải phóng, tâm can mới có thể yên bình.
Như tên của tác phẩm, Out of a landscape – Into a Mindscape là một hành trình vượt qua mọi giới hạn: đưa bạn từ bức tranh thiên nhiên hùng vĩ, xen lẫn cuộc sống thường nhật bình dị, đi sâu vào thế giới nội tâm sâu thẳm, của người nghệ sĩ, cũng như của chính bản thân bạn. Tự khám phá mình, tự khám giá thế giới nội tâm của chính mình, để tìm cách vươn ra khỏi những thước đo, khuôn mẫu, ràng buộc đó và tìm về một chốn an yên.
About HOÀI ANH
Composer, Improviser, Performer
Hoài Anh was born to a family with a rich musical tradition. She studied in professional musical schools in Vietnam and abroad: traditional music - đàn tranh (16-string zither), đàn bầu (monochord), đàn T’rưng (bamboo xylophones), at the Hanoi College of Arts; classical music - piano and harp, at the Bordeaux National Conservatory in France; electroacoustic at the George Bizet Conservatory in Paris.Having performed in many European countries (France, Italy, Switzerland, etc.), she always strives to bring the essence and uniqueness of Vietnamese traditional music to international audience.Under the thorough guidance of the most esteemed and prestigious traditional music and culture researcher – Prof. Dr. Trần Văn Khê, she earned her Master degree in Ethnomusicology (specialized in Hát Chèo musical theatre), from Sorbonne University in Paris in 2009. After that, she moved back to Vietnam to work at the Voice of Vietnam – National radio broadcaster as a music journalist.As a music lover, she has never stopped exploring, exchanging knowledge and learning new musical genres and instruments in the world. For her, music is the thread sewing all the inspirations in life. Being an active member, since 2018, of DomDom – The Hub for Experimental Music & Art, she has participated in many professional workshops of improvisation, contemporary music and composition, which helped her to find a new way of expression – free and liberal in manifesting thoughts and affection for nature, things and human, through which she can show her characteristics, define and form her own musical style. Since then, she has performed in Hanoi, Hue, Ho Chi Minh city and soon, in Da lat for the festival Nổ cái Bùm (05/2021).
June 2020, she composed In search of lost sound. This composition combines the intimate sound of the Vietnamese đàn tranh, with all extended potentialities of the instrument – on its strings, on its wooden structure. Blends in harmoniously a soundtape that assembles elements of daily life. It is her quest for sweetness and harmony which is rooted in the memory of a sound, just like Proust's madeleine.
January 2021, Hoài Anh introduced her new artwork – Tưởng at l’Espace (Hanoi) which lifted, once again, her favorite instrument – đàn tranh, into a new horizon. She explored new material for the strings, new techniques of playing, hence, created new possibilities for expressing on the zither, inspired of Ả đào melodies. This time, Tưởng, composed for her 95 year-old grandmother, took Hoai Anh to a further step: expanding the means of music expression from auditory to visual realms, by combining with video material to bring a more complex aesthetic and conceptual feeling.
About PHAN THẢO
Choreographer, freelance dancer.
Email: anniephanthanhthao@gmail.com
Phan Thảo was born in 1996 - Hanoi, Vietnam. She graduated from the Military Science Academy in 2018. She is studying Choreographer at Hanoi Academy of theatre and cinema with many dancing materials: Vietnamese traditional dance, ballet, contemporary dance, dancesport.
Having performed in many Vietnam’s shows such as: the celebration of Vietnam - Laos friendship in 2022, the commemoration of the 78th anniversary of the Independence day of Indonesia and the 10th anniversary of Indonesia - Vietnam strategic partnership in 2023,... She always wants to bring the truthful sense and sincere vibrations through body language to the audience.
September 2023, Thao joined as a performance artist in Hoai Anh’s artwork - Out of a landscape, Into a mindscape. That work was composed for the combination of electroacoustic music and Đàn Tranh by Hoai Anh and performed in the showcase “In the middle of chaos” in Hanoi.
Ses 2: Future Basketball
Artists: Ken Ueno and Arnont Nongyao
Duration: 40 minutes
Future Basketball is an installation/performance piece by the composer/ vocalist, Ken Ueno, and the video artist/sound artist, Arnont Nongyao, foregrounding their bodies as instruments, the dribbling of basketballs triggers sounds that traverse the range from the locally referential (memories of basketball games), to the global (open-air markets in Thailand) and abstract (masterpieces of early modernist electronic music), to the gunshots and references to protest, and to the uniquely corporal (towards the end of the piece, Ueno smacks the microphone against his chest - an ontological telescoping of the world to the singular, a single heartbeat, or as Ueno says, "my heart on the outside."
Video teaser : https://youtu.be/S2aozlmdYo0?si=EpMGP07tDbujpPRO
About Arnont Nongyao (Chiangmai, Thailand - Ho Chi Minh city, Vietnam)
Arnont has a profound appreciation for the sounds in his environment and delves into discovering the hidden vibrations behind all moving entities, whether they are humans, animals, or objects. Every movement produces vibrations that merge to create a rhythmic and melodic composition within a space, often unconsciously crafted by those making the sounds. Motivated by this, Arnont explores and records these ambient sounds, even if he doesn't understand the language of the area. This exploration fuels his sound art projects, where he collaborates to create public instruments and conducts workshops on communal sound-making using local materials. These materials serve as mediums that capture vibrations, allowing everyone to participate in and express their unique sounds freely. His work includes sound installation, video installations, and sound performances that engage not only the ears but also use vibrations that affect the body, fostering a sense of connection, understanding, and historical awareness of the space through shared vibrations.
Arnont’s most important teacher was the master Khvay Loeung (1940-2020), a Cambodian sound specialist and inventor, who was also an Ajar for funeral ceremonies. Loeung inspired Arnont to create DIY instruments and engage deeply with the act of listening.
Some of his selected exhibitions include solo exhibition, and new piece of sound performance. “Instrumental Possibility” 2023, Esplanade Singapore. “Future Basketball”2023 with Ken Ueno, HELLERAU, Dresden, Germany. Sphere”, SAC Art lap, ChiangMai, Thailand(2018).“Another Sound” co-work with Khvay Loeung, Sa Sa Art projects, Phnom Penh and ChiangMai, 2018. and group exhibitions “Listening Biennial 2023” LYDGALLERIE, Bergen, Norway. “Opera of Kard”, Singapore Biennale 2019, Singapore. “Currents 2019”, Phnom Penh, Cambodia. “A Visiblelity Matrix”, The Secession 2019, Vienna, Austria. Bangkok Art Biennale 2018, Bangkok, Thailand. “Postcripts” Bangkok Biennale, Bangkok, Thailand (2018).“Unstable(ry) Life”, 2016, Manif d’art, Quebec, Canada. 16th Media Art Biennale WRO 2015: Test Exposure, Wroclaw, Poland, TRANCE at Gallery VER, Bangkok, Thailand (2014). PROXIMITY, part of inSPIRACJE International at 13 MUZ, Szczecin, Poland (2014).
About Ken Ueno
Ken Ueno (b. 1970), is a composer, vocalist, improviser, and sound artist. His music celebrates artistic possibilities which are liberated through a Whitmanesque consideration of the embodied practice of unique musical personalities. Much of Ueno’s music is “person-specific” wherein the intricacies of performance practice are brought into focus in the technical achievements of a specific individual fused, inextricably, with that performer’s aura. In an increasingly digitized world, “person-specificity” takes a stand against the forces that render all of us anonymous. It also runs counter to the neo-colonial tradition of transportability in Western Classical music. As an outsider, Ueno has been drawn to sounds that have been overlooked or denied. His artistic mission is to push the boundaries of perception and challenge traditional paradigms of beauty.
Ueno employs the megaphone as a prosthetic extension of his voice. Armed with a megaphone, he is mobile and able to incorporate the narrative of movement in space, direct his sound in different directions, at different structural materials and angles, and to play with various lengths of echoes. And articulating the resonant frequencies of different locations in a space, means that architecture, too, can be read as harmonic structure (in this way, Ueno’s music sonically articulates architecture – in his installations, he “instrumentalizes” architecture). Ueno has developed an array of vocal techniques specific to the megaphone. For example, a kind of slap tongue whose attack is followed by a multiphonic drone shaped by changing the vowel shapes within his mouth. The shapes of these bespoke vowels, however, do not exist in any language. He has also learned to control the aperture of the multiphonic (or bandwidth) with the shape of his mouth, and can also sing in counterpoint or in augmentation with the shaped feedback multiphonic by humming into his nasal cavity. There are other techniques which involve ingressive singing, which, in alternation with exhaled techniques, allows me to circular-breathe.
Ueno is a Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is currently the Jerry and Evelyn Hemmings Chambers Distinguished Professor in Music. He has been invited to present lectures on his music at over a hundred peer institutions, including Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Columbia, Peabody, Stanford, Northwestern, USC, UCLA, Seoul National University, Beijing Central Conservatory, the University of Hong Kong, the Geneva Conservatory, and the Paris Conservatory. He holds a Ph.D. from Harvard University and an M.M.A. from the Yale School of Music, and his bio appears in The Grove Dictionary of American Music.
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