Musician Hoai An writes and 'lives' with history

Some examples include: Co Loa Legend, Truong Chi - My Nuong, Me Linh Drum Sound (Hai Ba Trung), Thang Long Spirit, Dong A Spirit, Bach Dang River, Son Tinh - Thuy Tinh, Chung Cake - Giay Cake, Hung King's Merit, Thach Sanh Fairy Tale, Reed Flag...

Musician Hoai An said his father, teacher Vo Dai Mau, instilled in him a love of Vietnamese history through stories he told since he was very young, from official history, legendary history to folk legends.

The first song he wrote on this topic was Truyen Thuong Co Loa, in 2001. “One night when I came home, I saw the book Viet Nam Su Luoc (Tran Trong Kim) on top of the cupboard, with important details underlined by my father. I understood that my father also had certain expectations, so I decided to finish writing that night. I still remember that at that time, my father was sleeping on the folding bed, I was sitting on the folding chair next to him, taking out the electric guitar to try to play a few notes, but I was afraid that my father could not sleep, so I put the guitar away, wrote "freely" in my head, and at about 5 am, Truyen Thuong Co Loa was born,” he said.

Musician Hoai An

Photo: NSCC

Hoai An said that at first he intended to make a separate album with the theme of history and legends, and even recorded quite a few and asked an artist to design the cover; but “fate” was not enough. It was not until the live show Hour H (2004) by singer Dam Vinh Hung that The Legend of Co Loa appeared for the first time, with an elaborate and grand production.

Although he is a math major, Hoai An loves and is quite good at literature, history, and geography. All of his works on history and legends come from his emotion and pride in the glorious past of the nation. He shared that when he wrote The Drum of Me Linh, he felt like he was living in the heroic atmosphere “From Nhat Nam, from Cuu Chan, from Hop Pho, all came to Me Linh”. And his eyes were teary when he wrote the last part “The sacred soul of Trung Vuong, came here in the mist…”.

In the series of historical works, Hoai An wrote 3 articles about the great victory of the Nguyen Mong dynasty: Thang Long Heroic Spirit, Dong A Spirit, Bach Dang River. According to him, those 3 great victories are the glorious highlights of the nation's history, because this invading army once swept from Asia to Eastern Europe, but continuously accepted defeat before the resilience of our army and people. "The more I read, the more I admire Hung Dao Vuong Tran Quoc Tuan. With Dong A Spirit, I want to talk about the preparation and training of the Tran dynasty's generals, as well as the martial spirit. Thang Long Heroic Spirit is determination, "The oath on the shoulder, we make the strength of men. “Sat That” resounded loudly between heaven and earth…”. As for Bach Dang River (which will be introduced soon), I have a strong feeling, when on this Bach Dang River our ancestors defeated foreign invaders three times: Ngo Quyen defeated the Southern Han army, Le Dai Hanh defeated the Song army, Tran Hung Dao defeated the Yuan-Mongol army. Therefore, although I wrote Bach Dang River along with a collection of songs about the Tran Dynasty, I have a passage “Bach Dang River - the river that defeated the invaders three times. The river was dyed red with the blood of the enemy. The heroic Bach Dang River!”. Oh, and in addition, my younger brother - musician Vo Hoai Phuc also has the song “Tears of An Tu”, another perspective on the mission of a girl who sacrificed her life to be a scapegoat for her country in the war against the Yuan-Mongol army”, the musician said.

"Picky" for both singers and audiences

When composing historical themes, Hoai An said he is quite comfortable in choosing modern or folk materials and colors. And he "especially likes and prioritizes using modern rhythm combinations, combining some folk music intervals that change according to the specific emotions of each section of the song. For example, in Bach Dang Giang, I wrote in the rock genre, with a range of more than 2 octaves. Or the song I really like is Me Linh Drum with 5 very different sections: heroic, painful, tragic...". In addition, he tries to keep the famous quotes of heroes intact and experiment with many different melodic directions to find ways to promote the message and images...

According to Hoai An, he is lucky to be very close to his bandmates, the stage department and the studio, so he gets many "preferential" benefits in terms of costs, equipment, time when recording, filming... The same goes for singers, if they record for his program, they also reduce costs - considered as support for the musician. "However, producing historical and legendary songs is still much more difficult than songs about love. First, the song is complicated from the harmony and arrangement, second is "picky" from singer to audience, third is the release time and the release channel to be effective", he acknowledged.

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/nhac-si-hoai-an-viet-va-song-cung-lich-su-1851085350.htm