WOMAD

Khac Chi Ensemble

From Vietnam

With the nightmare of war receding into history, the world has had plenty of opportunity to reappraise the image of Vietnam and to appreciate its wondrous natural beauty, the breadth and depth of its many indigenous cultures and the vast riches of its traditional music. Ho Khac Chi is a virtuoso player of the dan bau, a one stringed zither native to Vietnam. He has studied or taught at every college, conservatory or music school in his native country and his knowledge of both Vietnamese traditional music in all its many forms and classical Chinese, Indian and European music is vast. Emigrating to Canada in 1992, Chi took up a teaching post at the University of British Columbia where he teamed up with the exceptional vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Hoang Ngoc Bich and the accordion virtuoso LE Quang Hien to form the Khac Chi Ensemble. The group take you on a journey through the Vietnamese countryside, sampling the musical riches of the various tribes and cultures encountered along the way which they play on instruments with wonderful names like the k’longput, a bamboo pipe wind instrument like the Thai khaen or the t’ring, a suspended bamboo xylophone. It is a wonderful and inspiring journey.