Unity Nguyen [p.2]

NHA: Does your music target a particular audience or specific race or age group?

UN: It’s really rewarding for me to perform for Vietnamese audiences. Artistic expression is so crucial for a cultural community. With the evolution of the Vietnamese immigrant population in the United States, it’s been just over 30 years since the mass immigration after the Viet Nam War. As a community, we’re just getting over the trauma, shock and basic survival mode, so that we can step into realms like artistic expression, and exploring self-identity.

Our parents really worked their butts off to keep us alive and to establish the “American Dream” for my generation. And they were still too shell-shocked to even speak of their past experiences. Now many of the first wave [of refugees] have risen from poverty into middle-class America; we children have grown to be fluent in the language and skills here, and now we have the luxury and security to turn to self-examination and expression.

Here in California, I’ve finally started meeting other Vietnamese artists. Most, like myself, have also just started meeting each other in the past five years. There are a couple Vietnamese here who have been working with art and organizing community for decades, like Nguyen Qui Duc, but the majority whom I’ve met have been identifying themselves and putting themselves out as artists for less than seven years. I get a particular thrill working with Asian artists. There’s a certain exciting resonance.

That said, I haven’t specifically targeted the Vietnamese audience. I do very little promotion and mostly work through word of mouth. Interestingly, most of the requests that do come from the Vietnamese community, like for weddings or other events, are for the African kora. Somehow they can relate strongly to the aesthetic of it, yet its something new and exciting.

NHA: How does your experience being a Vietnamese immigrant influence your music?

UN: The fact that Viet Nam has a gruesome history of war is not unique. Much of the world has experienced the horrors of war, with most of these situations involving the United States government. A lot of the war refugees are located in the United States so my experience is a common experience of humanity that I can relate to other folks. A lot of the songs I sing are about humanity and peaceful living that transcends the border of Viet Nam, but being Vietnamese is my personal connection to this human issue.

Another way that my Vietnamese heritage affects my music is that the music scales and sensibilities of Vietnamese music give me delicious flavors to draw upon. Sometimes there are crossovers between Vietnamese and African sensibilities, (for example, use of the pentatonic scales). Studying the dan tranh opens up new realms of musical dynamics and subtleties to me. The bending of the notes in particular ways, the phrasing, and dynamic treatments of volume and timing and feel, are achingly delicious, and take my emotions and consciousness to altered places.

I grew up with Vietnamese music, but I got really deeply into African music before returning to Vietnamese music. During that time, there was always that intangible sense that I was trying to use a voice that wasn’t quite mine. When I went back to Vietnamese music, my actual voice changed. My relation to all the different kinds of music also changed so that when I went back to African music or the music of other cultures, I found that I could reach into different cultural roots and relate with them in an authentic way, because I have the connection of my own roots.

With Vietnamese music, as with other traditional music such as African music, there is a really strong respect for the teacher and the tradition. This mindset has served me really well in terms of fostering my discipline and humility towards the music. When I say humility, it makes me think of a really interesting aspect of being a performer. When you’re on stage, everyone is watching you. It’s an extremely humbling experience. If you think that you are a big shot, then you’re setting yourself up for some really hard lessons. Being a performer is channeling expression for not only myself, but for a broader human experience. It’s a very intense level of give and take, and it is important for me to get back energy from my audience and to draw on all the connections in my life that are part of the music.

Performing makes me reflect on my ego and my role with the other people in my life. It’s like when you do something embarrassing in front of a big audience, it makes you really sympathetic to other peoples’ imperfections. You have to be easy on yourself, otherwise you’ll go home and crawl into a hole. I’ve learned to be compassionate towards other people by acutely and publicly experiencing my own imperfections.

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