Bamboo is familiar to Vietnamese people. It can be used to build houses and make musical instruments such as bamboo flutes, and bamboo musical instruments.

Nowadays, bamboo flutes have been neglected due to the emergence of electronics musical instruments. Artist Le Thai Son has devoted all his life to preserving and developing traditional Vietnamese musical instruments.

Bamboo flutes are often played together with an orchestra for classical opera (Tuong) and popular opera (Cheo) at traditional festivals in the communal house of villages. Flutes have brought gentle and sophisticated melodies to millions people around the world.

Mr Son received his first formal flute lesson in 1967 as a student of the Culture College under the Culture and Information Department in Hanoi. Upon graduation in 1970, Son worked in Son La province, and then moved to work for the provincial Culture and Information Department in Ha Tay province. Apart from developing public movements in the province, artist Le Thai Son nurtured great ambitions to preserve and develop traditional music instruments and wanted to introduce them to the world. Therefore, he conducted specialised research on flute and t’rung.

The more a player infuses their passion into the flute, the more sotiphicated the sound becomes, Son said. Upon entering his house, we see an exhibition of flutes and musical instruments. Son makes and plays the sao doc, sao ngang and tieu (flutes and recorders); and from the northern mountainous regions, the sao Meo (flute of the H’Mong), and from Tay Nguyen, the t’rung (bamboo xylophone).

Apart from developing traditional flutes, Son tried to improve the xylophone. In the programme “Vietnamese days in Moscow”, both his small and large t’rung was well received by Russian people. In additions, t’rung is portable and can be used to perform both traditional and contemporary songs.

The idea of p’rong was inspired in 2002 and Son has taken great pains to make the instrument. Playing the P’rong is not too difficult as the instrument has keys to play like a piano.But melodies from a P’rong carry the deep and warm atmosphere of the mountainous forests of Tay Nguyen.

Son wishes to introduce his bamboo music instruments to Vietnamese people, especially the young, as well as international visitors.

In 1990, Son together with some tutors from Nguyen Dinh Chieu school, opened traditional musical instrument classes to people living around Tram pagoda in Ha Tay and gave free flute classes to underprivileged kids. He trained some students from the Music Conservatoire and the Culture University, who won high prizes in traditional music contests.

There is no limit to an artist’s creativity. Currently, Son’s wish is to make new music instruments to serve the public. His greatest pleasure comes from his whole-hearted devotion to the need of promoting and preserving the precious music treasure of his ancestors.