Paul Zetter – Drifting on a Reed

Our jazz reviewer continues to witness Vietnamese jazz evolution at the Hanoi Opera House.

The concert last Sunday led by saxist Quyen Thien Dac backed by a Swedish trio at Hanoi’s Opera House was another positive step on Dac’s personal journey to creating Vietnamese jazz.  As he said at the press conference, the group is a merger of Vietnamese spirit and Swedish style – they’re trying to combine multiple elements and apply new jazzified harmonizations to Vietnamese traditional songs as well as Dac’s pieces that draw from his more international jazz pedigree.

The three Swedes all of whom met Dac when he was studying in Malmo, Sweden, are a collective force to be reckoned with; Per Oscar Nilsson on guitar, a soulful foil to Dac’s more cerebral soloing, Johnny Aman, bass, keeping the music rooted in the dynamics of ever shifting foundations and Olle Dernevik, drums, providing with great sensitivity, the textures, accents and conversational counter rhythms so essential in contemporary jazz.

There’s a new sense of sophistication in this latest project of Dac’s that includes launching his accompanying CD, A Oi. He’s growing as an artist and now has such a prodigious technique on the saxophone that he has more resources at his fingertips to draw on. His writing on Another Northwind, Southern Moments, Thang Long Dance has more depth, sonority and maturity and he seems to yearn for more connection to lost ways whilst still embracing the new.  He’s getting more complex and more proficient – so these are exciting times indeed for jazz in Vietnam.