The judges had done Thuy Nga a huge favor by selecting Trinh Lam as the winner of 2007 PBN Talent Show. With a reminiscent of Duy Manh, Dam Vinh Hung, and Tung Duong rolled into one, he kills three birds with one stone. His self-produced album, Tai Sao, demonstrates his amateur skills at best.

With word choice such as why, weak, sorry, foolish heart, promise, love and break up, his writing on the title track is no less banal than anything Duy Manh has penned. His delivery on “Men Say Nong” is dead-on Dam Vinh Hung. He belts out his voice every chance he gets. When he reaches the high register, the volume becomes distorted because of the bad mix down. Worse is when he attempts to give his flow an intoxicating vibe like Tung Duong in “Hay Uong Voi Ta,” an awful blues-turn-swing arrangement. Again, the rambunctious mixing on top of the bottle-breaking screech of his voice is too painful to the tympanums.

Thuy Nga folks still get the best bargain (three for one) with Trinh Lam, even though they would aim for a better appearance. If they had a choice, they rather picked Quynh Vi (who came in second, but without a contract) than Trinh Lam. At least she has something to look at. As for David Meng as the people’s choice, enough bombs had been dropped.

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The Complete Sessions in which Louis Armstrong sings, scats, and blows Duke Ellington’s tunes and accompanied by the composer himself on the piano, what more could the jazz aficionados ask for? In “I Got It Bad and That Ain’t Good,” Satchmo demonstrates his mastery as a distinctive singer as well as an unmistakable trumpeter. Pops’ solo, which complemented by Duke’s minimal piano, is so damn fine and mellow. Even though Duke is an extraordinary pianist, he only plays when necessary, and when he does, the result is spellbinding. “I’m Just a Lucky So and So” is a perfect example. The way he plays the blues with his stride technique (pay attention to how he grabs notes the intro) and the way he plays behind Satchmo’s vocals are inimitable. Big up Pops and Duke!

What could possibly go wrong when Louis Armstrong Meets Oscar Peterson? With Armstrong’s marvelous voice and hypnotic trumpet backing up by the prodigious technique of Peterson’s piano, nothing wrong I could think of. These two masters of jazz virtuosity sure bring back that “That Old Feeling” with standards including “Let’s Fall in Love,” “I Get a Kick Out of You,” and the irresistible “Blues in the Night.”

My mama done tol’ me
When I was in knee-pants
My mama done tol’ me
Son, yes woman’ll sweet talk
And give ya the big eye
But when the sweet talking is done
A woman’s a two-face
A worrisome thing who’ll leave you
To sing the blues, in the night.

Damn right Pops, my mama done told me the same thang.

“Mambozart” is literally a Mozart’s “Symphony No. 40” arranged in a Cuban’s mambo style. With that in mind, I am sure those classical heads could figure out what “Afrolise” and “Carmen Cubana” supposed to be. Classic Meets Cuba, a joint between the Klazz Brothers (German musicians) and Cuba Percussion, is a classical album I don’t mind listening to even though they have taken the dead music out of its original context. My favorite resuscitations are the soothing, grooving rendition of Monti’s “Czardas” and the brief but hypnotic “Flight of the Bumble Bee” from Rimsky-Korsakov. I once spinned this album to an eighty-year-old man (who plays some classical piano, but remembers all the tunes by heart) and he was not humming to the classical melody, but also jamming to the beat and naming all the pieces’ title. I was like, “Damn, I hope I’ll still be that sharp when I reach that age or if I’ll reach that age.”

Even though I was not planning on attending the Vietnamese New Year (Mung Xuan Dinh Hoi) concert in Virginia, I hopped along at the last minute after seeing Nguyen Khang and Ngoc Ha on the poster. The show hosted by Trinh Hoi and Nguyen Cao Ky Duyen with performers including Y Lan, Vu Khanh, Cardin, Manh Dinh, Bang Tam, Hong Dao, and Quang Minh, and supported by “de nhat” band Phung Quan.

Y Lan kicked off the show with Pham Duy’s “Gai Xuan” to give the audience a vibe of New Year. She then covered Trinh Cong Son’s “Nang Thuy Tinh” in a pseudo-blues style. At the break the keyboardist played the imitating saxophone keys that sounded perfect for a memorial service. It was so bad that Y Lan had to cut right back to the song to illuminate the keyboard-sax solo. In Vu Khanh’s performance of “Co Lang Gieng,” I lost count of how many times the band sped up and slowed down the tempos to catch his singing. It was also the first time I heard Trinh Cong Son’s “Nho Mua Thu Ha Noi” played in a cha-cha beat. During a bathroom break, I heard a perfect comment from a guy who said in Vietnamese that the band played one direction while Vu Khanh sang in another.

After Cardin, Manh Dinh and Bang Tam performances, Ky Duyen complimented how well done the band had played. Sure, to accompany Manh Dinh and Bang Tam, all they needed to do was playing that robotic bolero repetitively. I am not sure if Ky Duyen meant what she said or it was part of her job to say what she had to say, but it sure hurts her credibility every time she comments on something deafly like that.

At least Nguyen Khang and Ngoc Ha didn’t let me down. Nguyen Khang performed two songs. He did quite nicely with Vu Thanh An’s “Anh Den Tham Em Dem 30” with his authoritative voice. If the band could swing up his rendition of “Falling in Love with You,” it would have been refreshing to hear. When Ngoc Ha was speaking, she was shaking and nervous, but when she sang Pham Duy’s “Tinh Hoai Huong” and Pho Duc Phuong’s “Ho Tren Nui,” she was in full command. Even the band was surprisingly good when backing up her powerful vocals on “Ho Tren Nui”; therefore, they deserved her recognition for “climbing the mountain” with her.

Too bad I couldn’t stay for the second half of the show, but Nguyen Khang’s performance of “Anh Den Tham Em Dem 30” and Ngoc Ha’s presentation of “Ho Tren Nui” were worth the price of the common-class ticket.

The ever-changing Ngoc Khue is moving on without Le Minh Son. Her junior solo, Giot Suong Bay Len, marks a fresh transmogrification in her musical direction. Together with an imaginative producer Phan Cuong who weaved traditional instruments into contemporary grooves, red dragonfly Ngoc Khue casts her voodoo spells into Nguyen Vinh Tien’s avant-garde folklore compositions that are based on the form of ca tru.

What makes the album so hypnotizing is the constant metamorphosis in Ngoc Khue’s presentations, which are full of tumult. She pushes and pulls her deliveries, ebbs and flows her vocals, bends and glides her phrasings to give her performances both playful and doleful effects. On “Giac Mo Dai Dang,” she transforms her voice into a child and invites the bell to ring with her own playful vocalization while the traditional string (dan bau) plucks against the upbeat rhythm. Elsewhere she starts off the title track with a spirit-possession ritual called len dong. By the time she’s into the trance, the funereal horn improvises over the mid-tempo beat to support her spiritual ecstasy. In the dirge-like sound of “Loi Hat Vong Nuoc Xoay,” her singing is like a threnody in memory of those who lost their lives in the twisted flow of water. In contrast, she knows how to ride her youthfulness along the groovy acoustic bass lines and exotic timbre of dan bau in “Trai Lang Toi.” It’s about time there’s a dedication to the boys in the (countryside) hood. Most of the traditional songs are about the ladies.

While many Vietnamese singers make marketable albums to put food on the table, Ngoc Khue stays true to her art. She doesn’t like to fit in and although she doesn’t say it, her album suggests a fuck-you-if-you-don’t-feel-me attitude. So those antediluvian expatriates who still love Vietnamese music just like the way she was thirty years ago shouldn’t even come near this unconventional music. It would be too modern for your damn ancient taste.

TTBlue hooked me up with Paul Desmond’s Quartet Live 1975 the other day and I have been addicted since. With his incandescent style, whole-range tone, melodic improvisation, and peculiar use of sequence, Desmond blows “cool” alto vibes into his infamous “Take Five” (the replacement of Dave Brubeck’s piano vamp with a guitar isn’t so bad) as well as ballads including “My Funny Valentine” and “Nancy.” The cover of “Manha de Carnaval” is a perfect demonstration of how to personalize a standard. Instead of a straight retelling of the original composition, Desmond and his sidemen (bassist Don Thompson, drummer Jerry Fuller, and guitarist Ed Bickert) restructured the tune with their own imaginative improvisations. Even though the mellowed rhythm section is perfect for late-night relaxation, these men won’t let you sleep until they are done.

Is Tran Manh Tuan the only saxophonist in Viet Nam? How he has been recognized as an eminent figure in (Vietnamese) jazz still puzzles me. It has to be that stamp from Berklee because he has not yet sounded convincible as a soloist. In fact, he still plays like a wimp, and his Bong Thoi Gian (The Shadow of Time) is a perfect illustration. His fuzak style of covering Vietnamese ballads is best suited in a root-canal treatment. They are so smooth and so anesthetic that would eventually ease up your pain. That’s actually pretty helpful, isn’t it? I am not saying that his music is totally artless. Comparing to other Vietnamese instrumental albums, especially those produced by Thuy Nga, his jazz-lite approach ain’t so bad. And if you like Kenny G, you might find Tran Manh Tuan enjoyable. Someone has to make some insomniac-worthy music.

(No hurt feelings, my friend. You have a good sportsmanship, and this is no way a personal attack. So don’t take it to the heart, bro. You know I got respect for you despite our differences in musical taste sometimes. One thing we can’t argue for sure is that Dieu’s still the best, and we can’t deny that she knows her Martini jazz. Cheers!)

Does it take an American to do Vietnamese music justice? Good question. Although I am flattered that a foreign musician such as Lorn Leber would take Vietnamese well-known ballads and jazzed them up, he didn’t push Falling Autumn far enough for the aficionados. On the opening “Winter Night,” the smooth saxophone plays the exact written melody. It takes the guitar half way into the tune to play some departed improvisation. “Rain in Sai Gon, Rain in Ha Noi” is the only number that Leber reconstructs the original and makes it his own. While the bluesiness in “The Stranger in Me” saved the track from being a hot-tub jazz—thanks to the hypnotic bass lines and gorgeous keyboard licks—the rest have fallen into that category. Placing Leber’s rendition of “My Funny Valentine” and “Autumn Leaves” against Miles Davis’s, the difference is between the sky and the abyss.