Music in French Colonial Cities
From: Jann Pasler
Date: Sun, May 24, 2009 at 8:11 PM
Hi colleagues,
For the last few years I have been working in the archives in Aix,
Hanoi, and Saigon, seeking materials on music in Vietnam 1880s-1920.
I've also gone through a certain amount of the local press. However,
all this is a bit like looking for bread crumbs in a forest.
If you have come upon mention of music or musical practices in
educational contexts, anything on indigenous music at the time, or the
musical practices of the French in Vietnam, I would be most grateful
for additional leads, including of any novels from the time that might
shed light on any of this.
with many thanks and best wishes,
Jann Pasler
Professor of Music
UC San Diego
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From: Lonán Ó Briain
Date: Mon, May 25, 2009 at 3:42 AM
Dear Jann,
You might find the following references useful if you haven't already come across them:
Dumoutier, Gustave. Les Chants et les Traditions Populaires des Annamites. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1890.
Knosp, Gaston. Rapport sur unde mission officielle d'étude musicale en Indochine. Int. Arch. fur Ethn., Band XX, 1911 and Band XXI, 1912.
Best wishes,
Lonan O Briain
PhD Candidate in Ethnomusicology
University of Sheffield
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From: Hue-Tam Ho Tai
Date: Mon, May 25, 2009 at 4:43 AM
A new musical form emerged during the colonial period in the South. It was cai luong or reformed theatre. The family of Prof. Tran van Khe was deeply involved in this emergence. His aunt, Tran Ngoc Vien also ran an all-female theatre troup, Dong Nu Ban in the late 1920s. Tran van Khe wrote his Ph.D. dissertation on La Musique Traditionelle au Vietnam. There are many references to him and to cai luong online, including the transition from a more traditional genre, ca tai tu, into cai luong. The Dong Nu Ban was closed down by the French because it spread anti-colonial propaganda. His mother was in fact beaten up at a demonstration in Cao Lanh in May (?) 1930 and suffered a miscarriage and died. It is very possible that there are references to both his aunt and his mother in the Aix archives.
Hue-Tam Ho Tai
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From: Barley Norton
Date: Mon, May 25, 2009 at 7:01 AM
The bibliography (pp.317-326) of Tran Van Khe's book La Musique
Vietnamienne Traditionelle lists some main sources in French from that
time, including those by French authors (Dumoutier etc) and Vietnamese
authors (Hoang Yen etc). On the development of cai luong, there is also a
PhD by Duane Ernie Hauch (1972) The cai luong theatre of Vietnam
1915-1970, Southern Illinois University.
You may well have already seen it, but Michael McClellan's article
"Performing Empire: Opera in Colonial Hanoi", Journal of Musicological
Research 22.1:135-166, references French newspapers around the turn of the
20th century and sources from the archives in Aix, which might provide
further leads.
Barley
--
Dr Barley Norton
Senior Lecturer in Ethnomusicology
Goldsmiths, University of London, New Cross, London, SE14 6NW
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From: John Kleinen
Date: Mon, May 25, 2009 at 7:23 AM
For my research on the Dutchman Jan-Georg Mulder who lived in Haiphong between 1904 and 1908, I found more than just some crumbs in local newspapers. The well-conserved files of the French Haiphong newspapers in Aix en in Saigon showed busy seasonal performances of a repertoire that was a mix of vaudeville and operettas. Soon the caf'conc's, the café-concerts, arrived from Paris which reinforced the French atmosphere of the city even more. The reviews in these newspapers must have been read quite well. McClellan's article was a good source as well for Hanoi.
John
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From: Jason Gibbs
Date: Tue, May 26, 2009 at 12:11 PM
Dear Jann Pasler,
I’ve done some work on Vietnamese musical history, but predominantly later periods. I have written a couple of articles in Asian Music that might have tidbits of helpful information:
"Spoken Theater, La Scène Tonkinois, and the First Modern Vietnamese Songs," Asian Music (Spring/Summer 2000), 1-34.
"The West's Songs, Our Songs: The Introduction of Western Popular Song in Vietnam before 1940," Asian Music vol. 35, no. 1 (Fall/Winter 2003-2004), 57-83.
Here is a list of citations from the time period you are researching:
Baron, Samuel. "Amusements, danses, chants et spectacles," Revue indochinoise (sept.-oct. 1914), 334-336.
Cordier, G. 1912. "Le théâtre annamite," La revue indochinoise (juin 1912), 564-587.
Lelièvre, M. "Conference sur le théâtre annamite," Bulletin de la Société des Études Indochinois de Saigon (1915), 11-27.
Trần Phát Văn. "Hí nghệ cải lương," Nông cổ mín đàm vol. 16, no. 12 (19 tháng 4 1917), ??. in Sơn Nam. Cá tính miền Nam. (Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh: Nhà xuất bản Trẻ, 1997), 121-127.
Baurac, J. C. "Courtes notices sur l'Indochine: I. Musique," Bulletin de la Société des Etudes Indochinoises (1899), 15-18.
---. "Variétés. Musique Annamite," Revue Indochinoise 187 (19 mai 1902), 457-459.
Gautier, Judith. Les musiques bizarres à L'Exposition de 1900: La Musique Indochinois: Chant annamite, danse cambodgienne., transcits par Benedictus (Paris: Librarie Paul Ollendorff, 1900)
Varton, Paul. "Journal d' un chanteuse annamite," Bulletin Francaise, Société International de Musique 4 (1908), 165-180.
There are later historical works that have some good information:
Vương Hồng Sển. "Chuyện âm nhạc Sài gòn đầu thế kỷ," Âm nhạc 3 (1993), 19. – would have some very valuable information for your purposes.
Vương Hồng Sển. Hồi ký 50 năm mê hát. (Sài gòn: Cơ sở xuất bản Phạm Quang Khai, 1968). – has the best account (or certainly the best-written account) of the creation of reformed theatre.
Trần Văn Khải. Nghệ thuật sân khấu Việt nam. (Sài gòn: Khai Trí, 1970). – also discusses early 20th theatre.
Nguyễn Văn Uẩn, “Hà Nội nửa đầu thế kỷ XX” , NXB Hà Nội, 1994 – has some very helpful fragments of information.
Nguyễn Thụy Loan has done some very good historical research (though with a nationalist and Marxist/Leninist viewpoint). Check out the following:
Lược Sử Âm Nhạc Việt Nam: Giáo Trình Cho Bậc Đại Học. (Hà Nội: Nhạc Viện Hà Nội, N.x.b Bản Âm nhạc, 1993).
"Suy nghĩ về sức sống Việt nam qua những chặng đường sử nhạc," Tạp chí Nghiên cứu nghệ thuật 30, 32, 33, 34-35 (1980), 27-34,20-35; 73, 58-69, 37-49.
"Ảnh hưởng của sự truyền bá âm nhạc phương Tây nửa đầu thế kỷ 20 với nền âm nhạc Việt nam," Âm nhạc 4 (1996), 34-36.
Tô Vũ, Thụy Loan and Chí Vũ. "Âm nhạc phương Tây đã thâm nhập vào Việt nam như thế nào," Tạp chí Nghiên cứu nghệ thuật 17 (1977), 78-90. – this is also excellent.
Please contact me if you need any further information.
Jason Gibbs
San Francisco