Prof. Dr. To Ngoc Thanh – Documentary photo
Professor Le Hong Ly – president of the Vietnam Folk Arts Association, successor to the role of president of the Vietnam Folk Arts Association of Professor To Ngoc Thanh – confirmed with Tuoi Tre Online Sad news about Professor To Ngoc Thanh.
Professor To Ngoc Thanh was born in 1934 in Hanoi.
He is the son of talented painter To Ngoc Van, but his career from an early age led him to follow the path of music.
When he was alive, he once said that in his childhood, to keep a quiet space for his father to paint, he often sneaked to musician Nguyen Xuan Khoat’s house to overhear Mr. Khoat and his friends playing and singing.
After listening, I became familiar and familiar, then I became passionate and decided to follow the path of professional music research.
Following his father to the resistance war against the French, Mr. Thanh attended Viet Bac Music School, then continued to study composition, the first course of the Vietnam Music School.
After many years of collecting and researching ethnic folk music, living in harmony with ethnic minorities in the northern highlands, To Ngoc Thanh studied abroad and received a doctorate in music science at Bulgarian National Conservatory of Music.
Spent more than 50 years traveling throughout the mountains, forests, villages and hamlets of the Northwest, Viet Bac and Central Highlands conducting fieldwork, collecting and researching folk culture, folk culture researcher, Professor, PhD. To Ngoc Thanh has produced many valuable research works, widely published domestically and internationally.
Typical examples include: Construction Northwest Thai folk music (1969), work Muong folk music (1971); Folk music of South Asian ethnic groups in Vietnam (1979); Learn traditional musicwritten with musician Hong Thao (1982);
Fonclo Bahnaedited by him (1988), Musical instruments of Vietnamese ethnic minorities (1995), documents Vietnamese royal music (2000); Notes on culture and music – Massive work, more than 900 pages thick…
To Ngoc Thanh also researched, collected, revised, enhanced, and incorporated into community cultural life 12 typical popular folk songs of ethnic minorities and 30 thematic folk songs of each ethnic group. .
He was promoted to professor in 1991.
Professor To Ngoc Thanh has experienced many important roles such as deputy director, then director of the Vietnam Institute of Cultural and Arts Research, then general secretary of the Vietnam Folk Arts Association (three consecutive courses); Vice President and then President of the Vietnam Folk Arts Association for the 6th and 7th terms (terms 2010-2015 and 2015-2020).
Prof. Dr. To Ngoc Thanh was awarded the Independence Medal, second class (2019), the Order of the Resistance against the French, second class, the Order of the Resistance against the US, first class, and the Labor Medal, first class (2001) and many others. Medals of all kinds.
He also received the State Award for Literature and Arts in 2001.
