Biography
VU NHAT TAN GROUP
The group is an ensemble around the Vietnamese composer Vu Nhat Tan, performing improvised and experimental music.
Starting in March 2009, Tan recorded several live sessions at STUDIO HA HOI, Hanoi, VN with Pham Quang Tran Minh, Nguyen Manh Hung, Scott Ezell and Olaf Zeumann.
An overview of the recordings in 2009 is available as an album named SUNDAY AFTERNOON at SUBSPINE(http://subspine.org/releases/SR-008-Vu.Nhat.Tan-Sunday.Afternoon.rar)
Together with Paul Sorrentino, the album THE SEVENTH STRING has been published on CD BABY (http://www.cdbaby.com/) in summer 2010.
VU NHAT TAN
Born August 8, 1970_Hanoi, VietNam Vu Nhat Tan began studying piano at Vietnam National Academy of Music in Hanoi in 1980. He then studied composition and musicology with professor Tran Trong Hung from 1991-1995 and graduated with his BA. From 2000-2001 he studied computer music and new music at the music college in Cologne, Germany on a scholarship from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD). In addition, he studied composition with Chinary Ung at the University of California at San Diego in 2002 as a guest student in the framework of the artists in residency program of the Asian Cultural Council (ACC). His music has been performed at the Roaring Hoofs Festival in Ulaanbaatar (2000), the Louisiana Festival of Contemporary Music in Baton Rouge (2002), the Totally Huge New Music Festival in Perth (2003), the Asian Music Festival in Tokyo (2004), the Arts Network Asia in Singapore and the Space of Traditional and Contemporary Music in China (2003)… Since 2002, Vu Nhat Tan has turned to stronger work in the electronics field and has himself performed with laptop, electronic equipment and sound instruments. He has given numerous live concerts in collaboration with other local and international artists in Vietnam. He is now teaching in the new department for electronic music at the Vietnam National Academy of Music in Hanoi and is one of three founders of the experimental music group DC-Factory.
Scott Ezell is an American poet and multi-genre artist who has lived in Asia more than a dozen years. His poems, lyric essays, and photographs have been published internationally. His book-length poem PETROGLYPH AMERICANA, published by Empty Bowl Press in 2010, is a journey through the landscapes, communities, and history of the American West, with resonances and reflections from Asian landscapes and cultures. He is the editor and co-author of SONGS FROM A YAHI BOW (forthcoming in 2011), the only published book of poetry about Ishi, the last American Indian to live as a traditional hunter-gatherer in the United States. He has written and performed music with modern and flamenco dancers, and has recorded more than ten albums of original songs and instrumental music, some of which have been used as film soundtracks. Scott Ezell’s paintings have been exhibited in group and solo exhibitions. Scott Ezell was born in Berkeley, California. He received a BA in English from UC Davis, studied Chinese at UC Berkeley, then entered the MA program in Comparative Literature at the University of Washington. In 1992 he left graduate school to study Chinese language and literature in Taiwan, and lived a dozen years in Asia, working as a writer, editor, radio host, street musician, recording artist, and record producer. He also traveled widely in China, India, Japan, Indonesia, and other countries. From 2002 – 2004 Scott Ezell lived with a community of aboriginal woodcarvers in Dulan Village, on the Pacific coast of Taiwan. There he rented an abandoned farmhouse and built a recording studio from driftwood and analog tape machines. In 2003 he produced the poetry-music-painting album Ocean Hieroglyphics, which was released internationally by Wind Records. His essay collection A Far Corner is a first-person account of life in a contemporary aboriginal community. After traveling through Tibet and along the Silk Road to China’s border with Afghanistan, Scott Ezell returned to America in 2005 and began writing the book-length poem Petroglyph Americana. In 2006 he lived in Barcelona, working as a freelance writer and performing music with flamenco dancers in anarchy bars. In 2007 he was invited to participate in an artist residency at the Tjibaou Cultural Center in New Caledonia along with two aboriginal sculptors from Taiwan, and created the poem-painting series “Migration.” In 2008 he composed and performed music for the Stimulate Modern Dance Company in Seattle, and wrote The End of China, a cultural travelogue of eastern Tibet and Xinjiang. His poem-painting series “Carbon Rings” was exhibited at the Center on Contemporary Art in Seattle in September 2008. Scott Ezell’s writing has appeared in the Asian Literary Review, Kyoto Journal, Modern Chinese Poetics, MaLa, the Taipei Times, Chan magazine, the Barcelona Metropolitan, and other publications. He has composed soundtracks for several films, and his music is available through Amazon, iTunes, other major distributors, and on his website. Ocean Hieroglyphics, a multi-genre project combining poems, paintings, photos, and music, has been re-issued as a book-CD package. In 2009 Scott Ezell moved to Hanoi. There he has written the poem-cycles “Hanoi Rhapsodies,” “Notes Among Friends,” and “Song of Vietnam.” In Hanoi performs improvised music with Vietnamese composer Vu Nhat Tan, which has resulted in the experimental music albums The Seventh String and On the Beach. Since 2009 he has written and recorded Where Will You Go When Your Heart is Free and Exiles in Love, two collections of love songs, and Electroluminux, an album of solo electric guitar improvisation. Scott Ezell lives between Hanoi and the West Coast of the United States. In March 2010 he was invited to the Bookworm International Literary festival in China, and in October 2010 he will give a series of readings and workshops in Singapore and Malaysia.
PHAM QUANG TRAN MINH
Minh was born in 1967 in Hanoi. He studied classic guitar at the Vietnam National Academy of Music in Hanoi where he graduated in 1993. From 1996 to 1998 he studied Jazz at the Music Conservatory of Kasachstan. Currently he is working as musician in Hanoi.
NGUYEN HONG GIANG is a noise artist from Saigon, Vietnam. Born in 1991 he joined the group for the live performance of the Green Space Festival Hanoi 2010.
NGUYEN MANH HUNG
Nguyen Manh Hung is a contemporary artist and experimental musician. In the field of art, Hung is known for bringing a fresh, original perspective to the visual arts in Vietnam and, while he focuses on painting, also creates artwork in sculpture, installation and performances. He creates art based on his experiences and observations of Vietnamese life, and his work often displays a particular fascination with vehicles and all things militaristic. Hung received his training at the Hanoi University of Fine Arts and has participated, both solo and in a group, in several important concerts and exhibitions in Vietnam and abroad.
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