To this day, the movement of classical guitar teaching is still continuously fostered by artists, spreading love and inspiring creativity among many classes of people. Continuing the values left by guitarists of the first generation. 8X generation artist Vu Duc Hien is recognized as a pioneer in reviving the guitar movement in the capital.
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Guitarist Vu Duc Hien at the "Spanish Melody" concert in September 2022
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Development of classical guitar in Hanoi
In the early 20th century, Vietnamese society had many changes, as the resistance war against the French colonialists had a profound and comprehensive impact on the material and spiritual life of the nation. Western culture dominated the cultural life of people in Hanoi. The first guitarists known to the public in the early days were Phan Van Truong, Canh Than, Do Chi Khang, Nguyen Thien To and Duong Thieu Tuoc. They are artists who learned guitar through the instruction of foreign artists and self-study from books.
Strongly influenced by the music of the "cradle of guitar" of Spain and Latin American countries, flamenco music playing techniques in this period such as rasgueado and graneado were very popular. Particularly, flamenco music playing techniques were performed with a steel-string guitar, creating harsh, tough sounds and the rhythm of the dance, making a vibrant, passionate and bohemian musical color.
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Artist Vu Duc Hien and Spanish guitar maker Manuel Adalid met in October 2023
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In 1956, Vietnam Music School was established as the first professional academic music training center in Vietnam, and guitar art training had a new development. The founding day of the Vietnam Music School, now the Vietnam National Academy of Music, is also considered the birth date of the Vietnamese classical guitar, and musician Pham Ngu was head of the faculty at that time.
In 1985, Hanoi Conservatory of Music officially opened the first university course for guitar. Up to now, at each entrance exam, the number of candidates taking the guitar major is increasing. Vietnam has updated a lot of information about guitar activities in the world, learned and solved many problems in methods, perspectives, textbooks and materials.
Vu Duc Hien - preserving and developing classical guitar for Hanoi's young generation
Vu Duc Hien, a classical guitarist born in 1983, is known as the "Fire Keeper" for the music genre that is "gradually disappearing" in the era of industrialization in Hanoi. He is admired by the audience through his emotional and delicate playing style with his forte in playing South American, Spanish music and traditional Vietnamese music.
He has organized many performances in Vietnam, typically the international Guitar Festivals in Hanoi held since 2018 called Alma Festival international and competition and Hannabach Festival international and competition, with a strong spread.
In 2020, he was invited by the Spanish and Argentine embassies in Vietnam to perform on important holidays. In addition, he also received many invitations to tour and conduct master classes in some countries such as the US, Germany and Spain.
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Guitar festival held by artist Vu Duc Hien in December 2023 with the participation of many international guests
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In addition, he also tours and serves as a judge for many international competitions in countries such as Thailand, Spain and Indonesia.
Vu Hien is also a guitar teacher, with the achievement of many of his students winning domestic and international guitar awards every year, and passing admission into regular courses of professional music schools in the country.
In spite of making a great contribution to preserving the classical guitar value in Hanoi in particular and Vietnam in general, artist Vu Hien still maintains a simple, humble style, true to the "old" quality of the music he pursues. He shared that playing and learning the guitar is not only about playing the right notes, keeping the right rhythm, or being soulful, but we must play the guitar in a delicate and natural way.
“I want to use my little knowledge to help those who want to learn guitar to partly realize the good things and simple things that are always present in music, life in general and how to play the guitar in particular," he said./.