Exciting festival atmosphere on Ba Den Mountain (Tay Ninh) in April

The vibrant atmosphere of Chol Chnam Thmay festival will be recreated on Ba Den Mountain in April, with Khmer dances that have become a heritage. Also on April 30 this year, visitors will enjoy special Don Ca Tai Tu performances performed by many excellent artists.

Taking place from April 14-16 of the solar calendar, the annual Chol Chnam Thmay Festival is the biggest festival of the year for the Cambodian people and for more than 1.3 million Khmer people in Vietnam. Notably, according to 2019 statistics, Tay Ninh has 7,565 Khmer people living, considered the cradle of Khmer culture in the South. Therefore, if you want to immerse yourself in the vibrant and colorful festival atmosphere of Chol Chnam Thmay Festival, don't forget to come to Tay Ninh this April.

During Chol Chnam Thmay, in addition to traditional rituals such as the grand calendar procession, the sand mountain building ceremony, the Buddha bathing ceremony, etc., Khmer people in the villages will be busy preparing to welcome the new year and visit each other, and enjoy the Tet meal together. If visitors cannot come to the villages to join in the bustling atmosphere of the Khmer New Year, they can go to Ba Den Mountain on weekends from April 15 to the April 30-May 1 holiday. Here, a bustling Khmer New Year will be recreated, in bustling Khmer dances, performed by Khmer girls wearing long sampot skirts covering the heels with colorful silk shirts, and Khmer boys in traditional sarongs.

A very unique Khmer art form will also be performed at Ba Den Mountain on this occasion, which is the Chhay Dam drum dance. As a national intangible cultural heritage, this unique Khmer art form requires harmony between movements and sounds, with movements that are sometimes as strong as martial arts, sometimes as graceful as beautiful dances.

The Chhay dam drum dancer is not only like a dancer, but also not much different from a martial artist, with his stances, acrobatics, sometimes using his hands, sometimes using his elbows, sometimes using his heels to beat the drum. Artist Tran Van Xen (Hoa Thanh town) said: “The Chhay dam drum is not only beautiful in its sound, but more magical is the myriad of skillful movements of the player. Only in Tay Ninh can people do that” ( Excerpt from Tay Ninh Land and People, published in 2021).

The graceful and charming Khmer dances will also be an indispensable performance at Ba Den Mountain on this occasion. For the Khmer people, folk dances such as Ramvong (circle dance), Lamleo, Saravan... with simple, cheerful and humorous movements have been ingrained in their blood since childhood, and have become a familiar lifestyle in the spiritual life of the people. At Ba Den Mountain, the cheerful and spacious space filled with flowers and grass, cool at an altitude of 986m, along with graceful dances to the melodious music, will bring visitors a very special Khmer cultural experience on this occasion.

Pentatonic music performance is also an art form that many tourists eagerly await at Ba Den Mountain this time. As an orchestra, composed of 5 sets of musical instruments, made from 5 different materials, creating 5 distinct tones: bronze, iron, woodwind, wind and leather, traditional Khmer pentatonic music when played together will create unique sounds, from very low to high, from sweet, melodious to deep, heroic.

In particular, coming to Ba Den Mountain on April 29 and 30, 2023, visitors will be able to witness the most outstanding performances by elite amateur musicians in Tay Ninh in the Southern Amateur Music Festival and Exhibition.

Appearing more than 100 years ago, Don Ca Tai Tu is a typical folk performance form of the people of the South, originating from ceremonial music, Hue royal court music and folk literature. With 229 Don Ca Tai Tu clubs, teams, and groups, 76 Don Ca Tai Tu families and six outstanding artisans in the field of Don Ca Tai Tu recognized (as of the end of 2020), it can be said that Tay Ninh province has preserved and strongly promoted the value of Don Ca Tai Tu art, contributing together with the people of the South to preserve and pass on Don Ca Tai Tu art to future generations.

Amidst the space of Ba Den Mountain filled with flowers at the foot of the majestic statue of Buddha Tay Bo Da Son, the combination of the sounds of the zither, the co, the zither and the monochord (four-stringed instrument) with the romantic, impromptu singing will bring emotional performances to the audience. This year's April 30 holiday at Ba Den Mountain will be a great opportunity for visitors to enjoy the musical space imbued with the folk colors of the intangible cultural heritage recognized by UNESCO, which has become the traditional culture and spiritual food of the people of Tay Ninh.

With the sacred 300-year-old Ba Den Pagoda complex, the sacred spiritual cultural complex on the mountain top area that is sparklingly beautiful at night thanks to the most modern lighting system today, the cool space like Da Lat with colorful flowers of all kinds, unique Buddhist cultural experiences at the exhibition area at the foot of the Tay Bo Da Son Buddha Statue, and especially the continuous performances of Khmer art, unique amateur music, Sun World Ba Den Mountain can be considered the most worth-experiencing destination in the Southeast region this April.