Preservation of cultural and historic heritage has great significance for a locality to affirm its own cultural identities. The conservation of cultural and historical values is now seen part of local community’s effort to show responsibility and gratitude toward their ancestors.

Artist Nhat Le, Vice Chairwoman of the Song Yen Bai Choi Club (first, right) and her technical team re-editing audio for use in a broadcast. Photo: THANH TINH

Hoa Vang District is now home to 6 national-level historical and cultural relics and 24 municipal-level ones. These venues become best places to educate young generation on cultural and historical values ​​of their hometown.

Teaching Bai Choi on radio

Since March 6, the "Learning to sing Bai Choi" program which is jointly launched by the Hoa Vang District Center for Culture, Information and Sports and the Da Nang Theater Artists Association has been held in the Da Nang rural district. Apart from teaching how to sing Bai Choi (singing while acting as playing cards), the program introduces award-winning musical performances at the Hoa Vang District singing contests.

Artist Nhat Le said that before COVID-19, face to face training programs on singing Bai Choi were open to teachers and students of local schools along with grassroots cultural officers. However, in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, such programs have been shifted to audio events sine early March this year, in a bid to facilitate easy access to the training among local folk song lovers.

According to artist Nhat Le, passion and talent are both necessary for a person who wants to learn how to sing Bai Choi.

Bai choi is Viet Nam’s 10^th cultural practice to receive the title from UNESCO. The art has been awarded intangible heritage status due to its creative recreation within a village community. Bai choi is a diverse art combining music, poetry, acting, painting and literature. Its practitioners include performers, card-making artists and hut-making artists. Bai choi singers must have the ability to improvise in their singing and performance in order to attract listeners and players. The person who is chosen as head of the game must learn by heart different bai choi songs and must know how to apply these folksongs in different situations.

Elite Artist Pham Hong Thai from the Song Yen Bai Choi Club who was passionate about folk songs from a young age remarked that Bai Choi is a unique traditional folk music in the Quang region. Bai Choi plays an indispensable role in the life of local people, contributing to enhancing their spiritual lives. Bai Choi songs includes traditional values and tunes of numerous types of Vietnamese music that require the singer and the accompanist to "fit in" with each other, especially with the improvised melodies of the singer.

The program to teach Bai Choi on radio which is compiled and taught by artists of the Song Yen Bai Choi Club is expected to run until the end of 2022.

Mr. Le Dinh Minh Hai, the Director of the Hoa Vang District Center for Culture, Information and Sports said that this program partly contributes to preserve and promote the value of the intangible cultural heritage in Hoa Vang District, promoting local cultural movements, and discovering talents who are passionate about Bai Choi.

Educating young generation on cultural and historical values of their hometown

Over recent years, Hoa Vang District has focussed on integrating local history into lessons of history subject at primary to senior high school levels. The heed has been paid to introducing historical sites, culture, scenic spots, specialties, festivals, customs and historical figures in the district to school pupils. In addition, exchange meetings between school pupils and local historical witnesses has been held.

Introducing local history into schools helps students better understand cultural and historical values of their hometown, thereby arousing and fostering the pride of national traditions, as well as inculcating social responsibility among the young generation, said Phan Huu Dung, the Deputy Head of the Hoa Vang District Education and Training Division.

Reporting by THANH TINH – Translating by H.L