What did Trinh Cong Son's sister say when the young singer sang Trinh's songs in English?

(Dan Tri) - Singer Trinh Vinh Trinh, sister of musician Trinh Cong Son, was surprised when approached with the project of translating Trinh's music into many languages. She said she always supports the artistic creations of young people.

On the afternoon of October 24, in Hanoi, the music project Let's Love Jazz was launched to the public, with the participation of musician Trinh Cong Son's sister.

Running from October of this year until the end of 2028, "Let's Love Jazz" is a project to revitalize and spread Trinh Cong Son's music through jazz, fusion, and acoustic arrangements, combined with translations into English, Japanese, and Korean.

In this project, from singers to musicians, most of them are young generation Z (the generation born from 1996 to 2012) and all love jazz and Trinh's music.

Singer Trinh Vinh Trinh (left) shares about remaking Trinh Cong Son's music at the event (Photo: Organizer).

Speaking to a reporter from Dan Tri newspaper , singer Trinh Vinh Trinh, an advisor to the project, said that Trinh Cong Son's music is profound and full of layers of meaning, and even when expressed in Vietnamese, it is not easy to fully understand it.

Therefore, what matters is not the language, but the genuine emotion and heartfelt feeling of the singer. Only then can Trinh Cong Son's music truly touch the hearts of the listeners.

“I think this is a challenging project that young people have put a lot of effort and seriousness into. Jazz is a difficult genre, a bit 'loose,' but the young people in this project sing well and touch the heart. Jazz and Trinh Cong Son's music are both poignant, and there's something that intertwines with them, so listeners feel a strong sense of empathy.”

"Translating Sơn's music into English is very difficult, and into other languages ​​it's even harder. Therefore, the translators and arrangers have to work very hard to 'transform' the music," Ms. Vĩnh Trinh said.

Responding to some recent AI clips of singers performing Trinh Cong Son's songs, Ms. Vinh Trinh said that she had listened to some rock music clips combined with Trinh Cong Son's songs. She found them enjoyable but also worried about the development and creativity of live singers.

"Some people are discussing copyright issues when AI sings Trinh Cong Son's music, but this should be handled by the Vietnam Copyright Protection Center for Music. This unit has the expertise, so they can handle it better than the family," Ms. Trinh said.

Quynh Pham – one of the singers who has been involved with jazz for the past 25 years, and also the founder of this project – explains that the project's name is inspired by the song "Let's Love Each Other" by musician Trinh Cong Son.

According to Quynh Pham, over the past decade, Trinh Cong Son's music has been reinterpreted by many young people. However, most of these are still just individual experiments, or in other words, beautiful musical notes… but not yet a comprehensive arrangement.

"With this project, whether sung in Vietnamese, English, or any other language, the melody still tells the same story about love, loneliness, loss, and the desire to live a decent life."

"We believe Trinh Cong Son's music can 'live on' in many languages. Each translation, each voice is a new dialogue with beauty and sadness - a dialogue that never ends," said Quynh Pham.

Singer Quynh Pham shares about the project of translating Trinh's music into English, Japanese and Korean (Photo: Organizing Committee).

Mr. Nguyen Nhat Tuan, Head of the Graduate Training Department at Hanoi University and language advisor for the project, said that he not only "translated the lyrics" of the song but also had to rewrite the emotions in another language.

"Vietnamese is a monosyllabic language with rich tones; even a small accent mark can change the emotional nuance. English, on the other hand, has a completely different rhythm and stress pattern, with distinct places of emphasis and release."

Processing a Trinh song in English is a parallel journey between meaning and music: Keeping the meaning can easily ruin the music, and keeping the music can easily lose Trinh's soul. Therefore, I always research carefully to find a similar emotional rhythm, not a sentence-by-sentence, word-by-word translation," said Mr. Nguyen Nhat Tuan.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/giai-tri/em-gai-trinh-cong-son-noi-gi-khi-ca-si-tre-hat-nhac-trinh-bang-tieng-anh-20251025004403107.htm