Vang vang trời vào xuân (Spring Reverberations)

by Cung Tiến, poetry by Thanh Tâm Tuyền 

with Mary Duncan, piano

Recorded live.

This song cycle, Spring Reverberations, uses the poetry of Thanh Tâm Tuyền, who was a prisoner of war in a north Vietnamese "re-education camp" after the Vietnam war and eventually made his way to the United States and settled in Minnesota until his death.

The themes of the poetry run along friendship, childhood, and being free amidst constraints.

Written and sung in Vietnamese, this song cycle was given to me by the composer himself in 2001. It wasn't until 2011 that this song cycle was finally presented in its entirety in St. Paul, Minnesota; I was the first singer to do so and, to everyone's delight, with the composer in attendance. (Picture right:  Mary Duncan, Cung Tiến, me.)

You can easily hear the easy blending of western music with traditional eastern music and how it expresses these unforgettable texts.

Listen to four clips below. 

Vang vang trời vào xuân (Spring Reverberations)

1.    Long Giao - Long Giao

2.    Trăng tù - Prisoner’s Moon

3.    Hái chè dưới trời mưa tháng bảy - Picking Tea Leaves in the July Rain
4.    Trưa tháng chín trên đồi cọ - September Afternoon on the Palm Trees Hill
5.    Bài hát tự do - The Final Freedom
6.    Nhổ cỏ hương nhu nhớ bạn - Picking Lavender Grass and Missing You

7.    Chiều cuối năm qua xóm ngèo - On a Year-End Evening, Passing Through a Poor Hamlet
8.    Chiều nắng hang trên đồi hương nhu - Late Afternoon Sun on Lavender Hill
9.    Ngã trên núi khi đi vác nứa - Falling on the Hill While Carrying Sharp Bamboo
10.  Vang vang trời vào xuân - Spring Reverberations