Such semitone intervals are not entirely a Western musical progression, but can still be seen quite a bit in Southern folk songs, such as in the Bac Lieu folk song below.
Example 13:
HO BAC LIEU
(excerpt)
Maybe you are interested!
-
Teaching Dong Anh Folk Songs to vocal music students of Thanh Hoa University of Culture, Sports and Tourism - 1 -
Identifying Vietnamese folk songs from 1945 to present - 4 -
The Confucianism adaptation in Vietnam through proverbs and folk songs - Vietnamese folk songs - 3 -
Borrowing Words or Ideas from Folk Songs to Describe a Certain Character of a Person -
Overview of Materials Used in the Project
Tran Kiet Tuong
It is the interweaving of modes and the subtle use of folk materials that makes Tran Hoan's songs always create special highlights in terms of the ability to express emotions.
2.2.3. Melody
When commenting on Tran Hoan, musician Tan Huyen wrote: “A sensitive, delicate soul, quite perceptive to the realities of life; a passionate love for his homeland...” [4; 349]. Those are also the factors that make Tran Hoan’s songs have beautiful, lyrical, mellow melodies, imbued with folk music.
2.2.3.1. Vocal range
The pitch of a song is the range from the lowest note to the highest note in the song. For any professional or amateur singer, choosing a song with a pitch that suits their voice is the first important thing to note. For vocal teachers, researching the pitch of songs to assign songs to students is a scientific operation, demonstrating the professional and pedagogical capacity of the teacher. Teachers need to rely on the characteristics of students' voices in each stage of the learning process to choose songs with appropriate pitch, ensuring that students can perform.
Apply and handle techniques well while also setting requirements for students to continue practicing to perfect and improve their skills. For example, when teachers choose songs with a narrow range, it will limit the ability to develop students' vocal range in the second and third years. However, if teachers use songs with a narrow range to assign to first-year students, especially those with poor singing qualities, it will be very suitable for gradually practicing and improving vocal skills and techniques. Songs with a wide range, requiring the handling of many transitional positions, will be suitable for second and third-year students. An indispensable factor when studying songs to assign to students is the range of the melody. Depending on the student's ability, teachers can choose songs with appropriate ranges. For a mezzo-soprano voice, the most beautiful range of vocal range is two octaves, from the note A in the small octave to the note A 2 . Thus, songs with a pitch range up to the b2 note or as low as the so note in a minor octave are often not very effective when students practice or perform.
Tran Hoan's songs usually have a fairly wide range but are all within the range of a mezzo-soprano, from the note A in the small octave to the note G2 . Most of the songs have a range of 11 to 13 intervals. The narrowest range is the 10th interval with some songs such as: Hon nuoc, Hon song Huong, Em thuong nguoi trong Hue dau tranh ... The song with the widest range is Giua mac Tu Khoa nghe cau ho vi dam with a range of two octaves, from the note G2 in the small octave to the note G2 . When using this song, we have two options: Transpose the voice up 1 tone for students with a normal mezzo-soprano voice and keep the original voice to practice expanding the low range for the mezzo-soprano voice with a low mezzo-soprano voice. One of the noteworthy points for vocal teachers when using Tran Hoan's songs is that most of his songs have characteristics suitable for a mezzo-soprano voice and are almost unsuitable for a soprano voice. Soprano has a range from c1 to d3 so it does not
can sing notes in the low register such as A, B in the small octave. Although the soprano voice when singing in the middle and low register still has a timbre similar to the mezzo-soprano voice, the lyric soprano voice still shows very well the soft, flexible musical qualities, but due to the difference in pitch, considering the overall performance of Tran Hoan's song, the soprano's performance advantage is limited, there are few conditions to show technical strengths such as the flexibility of the voice, staccato...
2.2.3.2. Using folk music materials
Folk music is a prominent feature in Tran Hoan's compositions. He skillfully and creatively applies folk songs from different regions, especially with songs that have the folk music of Nghe Tinh and Binh Tri Thien. As someone who was born, raised and has spent many years working in Binh Tri Thien, the gentle and profound folk melodies of his homeland seem to have become the flesh and blood of musician Tran Hoan. He uses Hue folk songs naturally and skillfully, as if the melody was already there when he put pen to paper. Many songs, when played, made listeners recognize the breath and color of Hue such as: I love you in Hue fighting, Rain falling, Hue love you, Invite you to visit Hue ... or the Hue quality is subtly hidden in songs that mainly use the Western 7-tone mode such as: Sunshine in March, A small spring ... He also has many songs about Quang Binh, Quang Tri and each song clearly shows the folk music material as well as the typical intonation of each locality such as: The sound of the guitar on the ninth road, Afternoon on the liberated Cam Gio, Picking a branch of red flowers to give you, Remembering Nhat Le ...
Songs with Nghe Tinh folk melodies are also a strength in Tran Hoan's compositions. For him, "Vietnamese folk songs in general and Nghe Tinh folk songs in particular are the most concise and profound symbols"
of a national soul” [4; 241]. Many songs have become familiar to the public and singers over the past decades such as: Giua Mac Tu Khoa nghe cau ho vi dam, Loi Bac bao truong chong di xa, Giận ma thuong, Mai em ve Ha Tinh, Vo ben Lam chieu ... Regarding the folk music materials of the Central Highlands and the South, although he did not write much, most of the songs left the mark of sophistication and flexibility in composition techniques, and are works of art of high value. Songs with the sound of Central Highlands folk music such as: Loi ru tren nuong (adapted from Nguyen Khoa Diem's poem), Con thac Damri, Mua xuan Tay Nguyen, Ben dong Dak - Bla, Nho Kon Tum... or the song with a strong Southern character with Tham ben Nha Rong have shown that Tran Hoan is a musician who has successfully exploited the material of Vietnamese folk music in his compositions.
The folk music material and local intonation in Tran Hoan's songs require vocal teachers to study and learn carefully about the singing style to ensure that the musical nature is properly expressed and the regional characteristics of each song are clearly revealed. Each locality and region has different folk melodies, intonations, pronunciation and stress, and even different pronunciations of vowels and consonants. Therefore, selecting and classifying Tran Hoan's songs according to the characteristics of regional materials is very necessary to design teaching programs as well as train vocal techniques for students. Also from the above material characteristics, Tran Hoan's songs are difficult to meet the needs of soprano voices. Folk music always requires warmth, tenderness, gentleness with pronunciation, concise enunciation, and closed sounds, while soprano voices have strengths with Western vocal techniques. Thus, it can be said that the characteristics of folk music materials are a factor that makes Tran Hoan's songs very suitable for the mezzo-soprano voice.
2.2.3.3. Use light music material
Tran Hoan wrote many songs using light oriental music.
Western. These are songs with rhythms and tempos suitable for European dances such as disco, tango, rumba, cha cha cha, waltz, slow... Some typical songs are: Hello, em - spring , Thanh dao Ngoc Chau (Disco); Son nu ca, Chieu ve tren pho nui, Chieu buon (tango); Ve Dong Le, Con thac Damri (Rumba); Trang giay Bai bang, Em van cho anh (Bolero); Tinh ca mua xuan, Mot mua xuan nho nho (Valse), Tim em, Dung vi em (Slow-rock)...
For songs using light music, understanding the characteristics is very necessary because this form requires the singer to demonstrate rhythm and dance when performing the song. This is an advantage for most intermediate vocal music students because they are at an active, creative age and have the opportunity to access many light music styles in the world as well as in Vietnam today.
2.3. Lyrics
As a musician who matured in revolutionary activities during the resistance war and held the role of cultural manager after the country was completely unified, Tran Hoan wrote songs as the urge of the artist's emotions combined with the revolutionary mission. With hundreds of songs, Tran Hoan has left quite clear marks on the country's history. Almost every one of his works contains the emotions of soldiers on the front lines of fighting and building the country. The lyrics in Tran Hoan's songs are refined but still simple and honest. His literary language style shows the sensitivity and sharpness of an intellectual - artist - revolutionary soldier. Along with the music, the content of his lyrics and the art of his language show the genuine and strong vibrations before reality. Reading or listening to the lyrics in Tran Hoan's songs, we encounter the style of romantic literature, and at the same time encounter a very close realistic writing style. For example, in Son Nu Ca, Chieu Song Cam or Det Vat Duong To ... he uses the literary style
describing romantic scenes with smooth, refined, highly figurative words such as: "The moonlight slanted over the cliff, faintly visible was the figure of a pretty smiling mountain girl" or "Following the rising smoke, the affectionate song, guiding the wind to gently float"... That is the moment when the artist's ego almost dominates the entire emotional flow of the work. This is a common language style in Vietnamese romantic literary works from 1930 to 1945. Besides, the simple storytelling and narrative style still appears in many songs such as " Pluck a branch of red flowers to give to you", "Come to Dong Le", "I love you in Hue fighting"... In these songs, he writes naturally as if the words uttered are melodically transformed into songs. Lyrics such as: “On the other side of Khe Sanh and on the other side of Se Pon, hello to the soldier who has returned from his heroic deeds” or “the rain drenches the star fruit leaves, I love the people in Hue fighting”… make listeners feel the closeness and sincerity like the words of the simple locals in the Central region. That is why his songs quickly spread across all battlefields and even in enemy territory. He wrote a lot about the localities, the image of the homeland appeared in Tran Hoan’s songs with the full breadth of space and cultural depth in a specific and subtle way. With each locality, he exploited the cultural characteristics, language, and intonation of the voice to put into the song. This is also the factor that makes performing Tran Hoan’s songs difficult for the singer, especially with songs with the musical elements of the Central and Southern folk music. Another topic area where he used storytelling is songs about Uncle Ho. The number of songs he wrote about Uncle Ho is not much, but they are songs that live forever with the country and people of Vietnam, typically: Uncle Ho's advice before leaving, Telling stories of green trees in all four seasons, Visiting Nha Rong Wharf ... The stories about Uncle Ho's simple yet great life are recreated in Tran Hoan's songs in a realistic and complete way.
but concise.
Like other musicians, Tran Hoan has many songs set to poetry or adapted from poetry. Tran Hoan's ingenuity in the art of setting poetry and adapting poetry is clearly shown in two outstanding characteristics: the ability to create harmony in tone between poetry and music; the method of selecting and condensing the content of the poem into a complete musical structure that makes it easy for listeners to remember. Outstanding among Tran Hoan's songs set to poetry and adapted from poetry are Lullaby on the field and A small spring . The song Lullaby on the field was condensed by Tran Hoan from the long poem Lullaby for the big babies on their mothers' backs by Nguyen Khoa Diem; the song A small spring was used by him almost as is, with only a few words changed or the position of the sentences changed to suit the development of the melody. In addition, he has many other songs set to poetry and adapted poems such as: Spring in the Central Highlands (adapted from poem: Ho Ve), Someone wearing an indigo shirt goes up the mountain (poem: Van Loi), Winter is coming (lyrics: Minh Thong), Sending love to mother (poem: Le Ba Tao), December song (poem: Vuong Anh), Longing (poem: Vu Ung), Autumn in Hue (poem: Xuan Quy), Lullaby (poem: Anh Tuyet)...
Along with the melody, the lyrics in Tran Hoan's songs are a vivid expression of the artist's sensitive and delicate soul in the face of reality. Many of his songs are not only musical works but also concise literary works with sublimation in the art of using language. Therefore, a thorough study of the content of the lyrics as well as the artistic techniques of literary language in Tran Hoan's songs helps vocal teachers better understand the nature, content and musical imagery of the song, thereby guiding students to perform the song better.
Summary
In chapter 2, we delved into Tran Hoan's life and songwriting career. He contributed to Vietnamese music in general, revolutionary music in particular, but his songs are deeply humane. His compositions are closely linked to the country's history, contributing to more clearly reflecting the face of the nation's resistance war as well as the vibrant atmosphere in the early years of nation building. Tran Hoan's songs have a fairly rich structure. Depending on the content conveyed, he chooses appropriate musical forms, from the form of a single section, two single sections, three single sections and the form of a series of sections built according to the structure of each part, all of which he uses. In terms of mode, Tran Hoan uses both the 7-tone mode and the 5-tone mode. In particular, he exploits folk music materials very delicately and sensitively. Listening to all of Tran Hoan's songs, we can hear the sounds of many regions, in which the most prominent are still the folk sounds of Nghe Tinh, Hue, Tay Nguyen and Nam Bo. The lyrics in his songs are refined but simple and familiar. Tran Hoan's songs based on poetry or adapted from poetry not only have high artistic value in terms of music but also demonstrate a sharp and concise literary thinking.
The characteristics of Tran Hoan's songwriting play an important role in selecting works and building a vocal teaching program for intermediate vocal students at Thanh Hoa University of Culture, Sports and Tourism. Although the number of Tran Hoan's songs included in the training program is not much, it certainly brings great significance in training vocal techniques as well as educational values for students.