Vietnamese free music

Composer Nguyễn Văn Chung’s music book of 50 hit songs has been released in HCM City. Photo courtesy of the Đồng Nai Publishing House

HCM CITY — Well-known composer Nguyễn Văn Chung has released a music book of 50 hit songs which he has written over the last 20 years.

The book has three chapters featuring the themes of love, family and children.

It includes the composer’s famous love ballads, such as Vầng Trăng Khóc (Tears of the Moon), Chiếc Khăn Gió Ấm (Beautiful Scarf) and Chuyện Tình Dưới Mưa (Love in Rain).

The book also consists of popular children’s songs such as Gia Đình Nhỏ — Hạnh Phúc To (Small Family — Big Happyness), Bố Ơi Kể Chuyện Con Nghe (Dad, Tell Me a Bedtime Story) and Nhật Ký Của Mẹ (Mom’s Diary).

Nhật Ký Của Mẹ is about mother’s love. It was released in 2011 and quickly became famous in the country and overseas.

In 2014, the song was translated into Japanese by composer Yoshimoto Kayo and sung by Vietnamese-Japanese singer Hải Triều, which became popular in Japan.

In 2015, the song performed by pop star Hiền Thục ranked 10th on the CD The Best of Ballroom Music Vol. 36 produced by Casa Musica, a music company in Germany. The album features 45 works performed by popular artists and bands from different countries.

It has had more than 18 million views on YouTube since its release with the voice of singer HiềnThục in 2013.

Chung’s music book includes beautiful pictures and sheet music to help readers study singing.

It also comes with photos featuring pop stars such as Khánh Phương and Bảo Thi who performe Chung’s songs.

Chung began his career in 2003 after working for Nhạc Xanh Studio, one of the city’s private music agencies.

His music styles are pop and R&B, with Vietnamese folk elements.

He has composed about 700 songs, including 300 for children.

“I have worked hard to bring more suitable songs for children, containing lessons on life and family,” said Chung, 34, who recently received a copyright certificate for his 300 songs given by the Copyright Office under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. VNS

HANOI

PERFORMANCE

Glamour 2

8pm on April 24

L’Espace

2 Trang Tien Street, Hoan Kiem District,

A new music programme entitled “Glamour 2” should be a journey filled with nostalgia but full of new discoveries, honour notable French songs.

The event features the participation of foreign artists: pianist Max Schwingeling, guitarist and singer Kenjah David, guitarist Guillaume de Miribel, percussion artist Christopher Michael and bass artist Oosamu Sakurai; as well as Vietnamese singer Hua Thanh Tu and the Bamboo Tambourine group.

Ticket: VND200,000

Promotional ticket: VND150,000 (until April 17).

EXHIBITION

‘Virtual Private Realms’ Exhibition

Manzi Art Space

14 Phan Huy Ich Street, Ba Dinh District,

The exhibition ‘Virtual Private Realms’ brings together the works of 7 artists: Lananh Le, Din Sama, Nguyen Duc Huy, mi-mimi, Nghia Dang, Trinh Cam Nhi, and Ha Ninh, with a focus on their painting practices.

Belonging to the 9X (millennial) generation, these artists have contributed to a new wave of practitioners in the Vietnamese art scene.

Exhibition: Eyes without a Face

The exhibition area inside the Japan Foundation library

27 Quang Trung, Hoan Kiem District,

Eyes without a Face is a project co-organized by the Japan Foundation Center for Cultural Exchange in Vietnam and Manzi Art Space, with support from the Goethe-Institut, and other organizations, individuals as well as close friends.

Exhibition: Retro

The Muse Art Space

47 Trang Tien Street, Hoan Kiem District,

RETRO is an exhibition that goes back in time. Retro is also a popular term in fashion, furniture design, and art.

The RETRO exhibition will present paintings and objects in line with the modern intellectual culture world in Vietnam, mostly from the beginning to the middle of the 20th century.

HO CHI MINH CITY

EXHIBITION

Exhibition “The Resonance of remembrance”

Vy Gallery

20 Nguyen Van Thu, Da Kao, District 1,

“The Resonance of remembrance” exhibition has been organised on the occasion of the whole country celebrating the biggest holiday, National Reunification – April 30.

The exhibition consists of 5 works, including 4 lacquer works and 1 oil painting for the purpose of conveying to the public the message of spiritual, historical and artistic values of the wars to preserve the country’s peace.

In particular, ST25 rice was sold for more than $1,000 per ton and Jasmine rice for $600 per ton.

The Vietnam National Seed Group (Vinaseed) has also inked many contracts to export rice to Australia, the Netherlands, and the Czech Republic at high prices.

The first batch of Vietnamese rice exported in 2021 was 1,600 tons of Trung An High-tech Agriculture Joint Stock Company. Its two types of Jasmine rice were sold for $680 and $750 per ton.

Pham Thai Binh, general director of Trung An, told VietNamNet that the company has changed its policy: producing and exporting high quality rice only.

Vietnam was known for exporting low-grade, low-priced rice for the past 30 years. Now, Vietnamese firms export high-quality rice for high prices. Vietnam is also the producer of ST25, the most delicious rice product in the world.

According to Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Le Quoc Doanh, after more than 30 years of conquering the world rice market, Vietnam is no longer inferior to others in terms of the quality and price of its exported rice. The country currently has many valuable rice varieties and the price for Vietnamese rice is sometimes higher than that of Thailand and India.

Doanh said that five to six years ago Vietnam had 35-40% of high-quality rice varieties, but now the ratio is 75-80%. As the quality of rice has increased, the export price has risen very quickly. The rice industry has been successfully restructured in recent years, although the rice cultivation area has been reduced.

Recently, many people were “startled” by the information that Vietnam imported rice from India. But for experts, this is ‘the new normal’ of Vietnamese rice. Vietnam lacks and has to import low-grade rice to process cattle-feed as the proportion of high-grade rice varieties is overwhelming.

The Bangkok Post on January 25 commented that this is “Vietnam’s wise rice strategy”. Vietnam chose to import Indian rice at lower prices to meet domestic demand, while focusing on producing high-quality rice for export. The production of high-quality rice is on the right track with the world, taking advantage of export opportunities to the EU when the EVFTA went into effect.

Dr. Dang Kim Son, former director of the Institute of Policy and Strategy for Agriculture and Rural Development, acknowledged that rice is the most successful export commodity in recent years. From exporting 1 million tons per year, Vietnam has become the world’s leading rice exporter. If in the past, the price for Vietnamese rice was much lower than the world rice price, especially Thai rice, now it is equal or even higher.

Vietnamese rice holds No. 1 position in world

In mid-2018, when the price Vietnamese rice surpassed Thailand’s, many people called it a “miracle” because, for many years, Vietnamese rice had been inferior to Thai and Indian rice in both quantity and quality.

As a result, the position of Vietnamese rice has changed. In 2020, Vietnam overtook Thailand to become the world’s second rice exporting country, with 6.15 million tons, earning $3.07 billion. Notably, the export volume decreased by about 3.5% but turnover increased by 9.3%.

Vietnamese rice has surpassed both Thailand and India to take the number one spot in the world in terms of selling price. In 2020, with an average export price of $499 per ton, an increase of 13.3% compared to 2019, Vietnamese rice farmers earned high profits. It is estimated that with an output of about 7 million tons per hectare, farmers can earn from VND65-VND70 million per hectare, while the cost is only about VND16-VND17 million per hectare. It means a profit of 70%, equivalent to about VND50 million per hectare.

In early 2021, Vietnamese rice maintained its top position in price. On March 25, the price for Vietnam’s 5% broken rice increased to $515-520 per ton, compared to $500-$518 per ton for Thai rice and $398-403 per ton for Indian rice of the same kind. In January 2021, Vietnam’s rice export price hit $551.7 per ton.

‘Heavenly pearls’

According to the Vietnam Food Association (VFA), rice exports in 2021 will be very positive. The Asian rice market started to heat up again as customers were rushing to buy. Many countries have great demand for fragrant rice and sticky rice, which are an advantageous commodity of Vietnam. Vietnam’s export outlook is wide open thanks to opportunities from a number of markets that have signed free trade agreements (FTA) with Vietnam. In particular, under the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA), Vietnam has a quota of 80,000 tons of rice per year with 0% tax.

However, Pham Thai Binh said that to ensure a stable future for Vietnam’s rice export, it is necessary to strengthen the link between enterprises and farmers to improve quality of rice. Local governments need to find solutions to promote these links. This is a prerequisite for enterprises and farmers to jointly produce rice for export to serve various needs of the international market.

Agricultural expert Hoang Trong Thuy said that rice trading firms should keep shifting the structure of exported rice to high value-added types because if Vietnam produces low-grade rice, it will not be able to compete with India and Pakistan. Investing in the production of high-quality rice will help increase export value and enable Vietnamese rice to enter big markets such as Japan, Korea, and the EU.

Tam An

Fresh CEO rush shakes up Vietnam’s banking arena, photo Le Toan

In February, Shinhan Bank Vietnam named Lee Taekyung, former CEO of Shinhan Bank Cambodia, as new CEO of the local franchise. With 29 years of experience under his belt, Taekyung has been in charge of various positions of strategy, planning, risk management, and marketing, among others.

He previously took the helm as head of the Global Business Division of Shinhan Bank Korea and gained working experience at Shinhan Bank America and Shinhan Bank Cambodia. In the latter, Taekyung doubled the size of the bank, including assets, profits, the number of branches, and employees in just two years.

“In the ever-evolving financial landscape, customers’ needs will change quickly. We must be a bank that keeps pace with customer changes with customer-oriented value as the top priority,” he noted. “Vietnam is the most important country globally for Shinhan Financial Group, and we sincerely appreciate all of the customers. Shinhan Bank Vietnam will continue to expand corporate social responsibility activities in Vietnam and contribute more to society.”

Standard Chartered Vietnam also appointed a new CEO in February. Michele Wee, a seasoned banker with over 25 years of industry experience, joined Standard Chartered in 2011 as global head of E-commerce Sales to build a business distribution channel for the bank’s Financial Markets (FM) clients.

Prior to her appointment as CEO in this country, she was the head of FM for Singapore, Australia, and Brunei, in which she was responsible for the development and execution of these markets’ FM strategy.

“Vietnam is an important market for our global network with significant opportunities to develop our businesses with universal banking capabilities. My key focus will be on providing valuable support and benefits to our clients, regulators, and the communities, building on our unrivalled local knowledge and international expertise,” Wee said.

She takes over the reins from Nirukt Sapru who was appointed as CEO for Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia in 2013, and in 2015 took on the expanded role as the regional CEO for ASEAN and South Asia cluster markets including Australia, Brunei, Nepal, the Philippines, and Sri Lanka.

Last year, the Vietnamese subsidiary of Deutsche Bank appointed Huynh Buu Quang, former CEO of Maritime Bank (MSB), as its acting CEO. Quang had served as the CEO of locally-invested bank MSB for four years. He has 25 years of experience in the banking and financial sector and had previously held senior positions at HSBC.

Deutsche Bank’s Asia-Pacific CEO Alexander von zur Muehlen said, “With Vietnam a key growth market for our bank in ASEAN, we are delighted to have an individual of Quang’s calibre and experience leading the next phase in the expansion of the local franchise.”

In the region, Deutsche Bank AG has a long track record in providing corporate finance and advisory solutions to Vietnamese corporates, leading a number of notable capital market transactions. The bank’s expertise in loans and structured finance is also well known. Since 2017, Deutsche Bank has raised more than $1 billion in debt, loan and equity capital annually for Vietnamese corporates. The German lender confirmed its commitment in Vietnam to support higher trade flows from Europe, which are expected to increase following the recently ratified EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement.

Specifically, major Thai bank Kasikornbank received approval from the State Bank of Vietnam to open its Ho Chi Minh City branch in February. Kasikornbank aims to serve Thai business customers and clients of all shapes and sizes who have invested in Vietnam, as well as local retail customers. It targets lending of 10 billion baht ($318 million) in its first year of operation while also investing in startups with the aim of scouting advanced digital technologies for increased business opportunities.

“Kasikornbank has used the knowledge gained from services offered at its two representative offices in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in order to upgrade the representative office in Ho Chi Minh City to a bank branch. It will focus on offering services to Thai, Chinese, Japanese, and South Korean companies wishing to expand their businesses in Vietnam for international trade and investment, as well as local entrepreneurs, especially those conducting business with Thai corporate customers of Kasikornbank,” the bank stated.

Elsewhere, Mizuho Financial Group, one of Japan’s largest financial groups, appointed managing executive officer of its banking unit Masahiko Katoas the new CEO of the bank in February.

By Celine Luu