Tuyen Quang strives to preserve ethnic folk singing

The northern mountainous province of Tuyen Quang is working hard to revitalise a folk singing genre performed by the San Diu ethnic group, known as Soong co.

Tuesday, April 15, 2014 20:31

The northern mountainous province of Tuyen Quang is working hard torevitalise a folk singing genre performed by the San Diu ethnic group,known as Soong co.

The unique singing style can be performedin daily activities or during wedding ceremonies and festivals. Peopleneed to be quick-minded and have a wide knowledge to create reparteeswhen practicing the singing.

San Diu people make up some 1.4 percent (over 10,000 people) of Tuyen Quang’s population.

However,in Ninh Lai, Thien Ke and Son Nam communes, which have the highestnumbers of San Diu people in the province, only a few elderly people cansing Soong co now, according to the provincial Department of Culture,Sports and Tourism.

To cope with such a problem, Tuyen Quang hasencouraged its localities to set up teams of local singers whilecollecting materials about the practice to increase its popularity.

Theprovince has also organised regular Soong co singing programmes in itscommunes to nurture the custom, which it hopes to be recognised asintangible national heritage.

Director of the provincialdepartment Nguyen Viet Thanh said Tuyen Quang is compiling a dossier tobe submitted to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism seeking theaccolade.

At present, Tuyen Quang has four pieces of heritagelisted as national treasures: The Then singing and Long Tong (FieldWork) Festival of Tay people and the Pao dung singing and Cap sac(coming of age) ritual of Dao people.-VNA

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