Each of the 54 ethnic groups in Vietnam has its musical instruments inherited from their ancestors, reflecting their life, rituals, and living environment. There can be hundreds of Vietnamese musical instruments; some are familiar, while others stand out worldwide. In this article, we can only list and detail a small portion of this extensive list.
An Overview of Vietnamese Musical Instruments
The origin of some traditional Vietnamese musical instruments dates back to the primitive era, in the first form of government known in Vietnam, the Hung Kings Dynasty. Other instruments were invented or upgraded from primitive ones about a couple hundred years ago.
It is not easy to find these Vietnamese musical instruments in modern time bands. You are most likely find them in museums and traditional performances that are recognized as intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO, like “Nhã Nhạc” (Vietnamese court music in Hue), “Quan Họ Bắc Ninh” (Vietnamese antiphonal music in the North), and “Đờn Ca Tài Tử” (South Vietnam theatrical music), or many familiar tunes of folk songs and Central Highland’s music.
Most traditional Vietnamese musical instruments are string, wind, and percussion instruments made of natural materials like wood, bamboo, stones, ivory, and animal skins. They can perform solo or in an orchestra. While the traditional music of people in the deltas uses more string instruments, people in the mountainous area tend to use percussion and wind instruments.
Vietnamese String Instruments
It is not easy to list and tell each kind of string instrument in Vietnam because there are too many with similar looks. And like many other aspects of Vietnamese culture, some Vietnamese musical instruments are also partly influenced by or adopted from Chinese ones, like “Đàn tranh” (16-stringed zithers) and “Đàn tỳ bà” (4-stringed lute, with the body shaped like a water drop).
Đàn tranh and Đàn tỳ bà
In “Đờn Ca Tài Tử” performance, some signature lutes include “Đàn nguyệt” or “Đàn kìm” (2 strings, a moon-shaped body with no soundhole) or “Đàn sến” (2 strings, flower-shaped lute) are more popular. “Đàn bầu” (gourd zither with a single string) and “Đàn nhị”, or “Đàn cò” (2-stringed bowl-shaped chordophone) are usually played in “Hát xẩm” performances (Vietnamese folk songs in the North). “Đàn k’ni” (a single-stringed instrument with which you have to stretch the string with your mouth) is one of the rare string instruments in Central Highland’s music orchestra.
Đàn nguyệt and Đàn sến
Đàn bầu and Đàn nhị
Đàn k’ni
Other Vietnamese Strings Instruments
- Đàn tam: 3-stringed lute with the body covered by python skin
- Đàn tứ: 4-stringed lute
- Đàn hồ: the coconut 2-stringed violin
- Đàn đáy: 3-stringed lute with a rectangular body
- Đàn tính: 2 or 3-stringed lute of the Tay and Thai people in the North
- Đàn tam thập lục: 36-stringed zither
Đàn tam and Đàn tứ
Đàn hồ and Đàn đáy
Đàn tính and Đàn tam thập lục
Vietnamese Wind Instruments
The two popular wind instruments in Vietnam are “Sáo trúc”, the general name for any transverse flute made of bamboo, 1-2 cm thin, with 6 sound holes, and “Tiêu” – the vertical flute, mostly used in orchestras in North Vietnam. Other versions of these flutes are:
- Sáo diều: includes many tubes of different sizes tied to a kite to make sounds when the kite is flying in the sky
- Sáo mông: a transverse flute played by the H’mong
Sáo trúc and Tiêu
Sáo diều and Sáo mông
Wind Instruments of Vietnamese Ethnic Minorities
Among the Vietnamese musical instruments, those of ethnic groups in mountainous areas have quite rare playing methods and looks:
- Khèn: quite popular in the music of H’mong and Ede people, includes many tubes of different lengths tied together with a vertical mouthpiece going through near one end
- Klong put: with which people move air into the tubes by clapping their hands instead of blowing, performed mainly by women in Central Highlands.
Khèn and Klong Put
While some Vietnamese musical instruments of people in the deltas and mountainous areas are quite different, “Kèn bầu”, a gourd oboe, is used in both places, in “Nhã Nhạc” and in the festivals of the Tay, Thai, or Chams.
Kèn bầu
Vietnamese Percussion Instruments
Vietnamese Drums
There are several kinds of drums of different ethnicities.
From small sizes like:
- Trống xẩm: a set of small wooden drums about 4-5 cm high
- Trống paranưng: a signature flat drum of the Chams
- Trống đế: used in “Ca Trù”, Vietnamese court music in the North
- Trống bồng: a sand clock lookalike drum
- Trống cơm: translated as the “rice drum” because the drummer used rice to adjust the pitch of the drum by sticking it onto the drum surfaces
Trống xẩm and Trống paranưng
Trống đế and Trống bồng
Trống cơm
Larger size drums include:
- Trống chiến: used to highlight the breaks in traditional Vietnamese musicals when the singers end or pause their sentences
- Trống cái: about 60-70 cm high and 40-50 cm in diameter
Trống chiến and Trống cái
The largest and heaviest one is probably “Trống đồng”, the bronze drum, used in religious rituals or assembling an army. The special thing is the sophisticated patterns on the surface of the drum, an 8 or 12-pointed star at the center, and some toad sculptures near the edge to create different sounds. “Trống đồng” is now mainly preserved in museums like the Vietnam History Museum as a cultural symbol rather than played as a musical instrument.
Trống Đồng
However, the title of the most unique drum in Vietnamese musical instruments has to go to “Trống đất” or the “earth drum”. The drum’s body is the actual earth, where people dug a hole in the ground and covered it with the outer skin of bamboo shoots. One string is connected with this cover and tied to another 1-meter string stretched about 20 cm above the ground. The drummer will hit the horizontal string instead of the surface to make sounds. It was believed that this drum dated back to the 6th reign of Hung Kings as a random invention when the soldiers were nailing the posts to the ground to put up the tents.
Trống đất
Vietnamese Xylophones
Besides drums, the xylophones also vary in size and materials:
- Đàn đá: rock xylophone of people in Central Highlands
- Đàn t’rưng: bamboo xylophone of Gia Rai and Ba Na people, making a clear sound resembling that of a stream flow
- Biên khánh – Biên chung: a set of flat rock pieces “khánh” or bronze bells “chung”, hung on a wooden frame, mostly played in “Nhã Nhạc Cung Đình Huế”
Đàn đá and Đàn t’rưng
Biên khánh and Biên chung
Beat Instruments
Another set to be mentioned in this list of percussions are instruments to keep the beat of the music:
- Phách: a set of two flat bamboo sticks and a wooden cylinder stick struck on another 30-cm long bamboo piece; also means “the beat”
- Sênh tiền: a combination of clapper, rasp, and jingles with coins nailed to the wooden sticks
- Song lang: a clapper made from a round, hollow wooden piece attached with a wooden ball by a flexible curved metal, it can be played by clipping it with your hands or stepping on it with your foot.
- Mõ: usually used by monks in temples when they chant, or by the “village newsboys” in the old-time to catch the attention of villagers when there are announcements from the authority
Phách and Sênh tiền
Song lang and Mõ
And last but not least is the most well-known “Cồng – Chiêng”. This is an element of the “Space of Gong Culture” titled Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. “Cồng chiêng” is two words for two-hand gongs that look similar and go together in the music performance of people in the Central Highlands. “Cồng” is a flat surface gong, while “Chiêng” is a nipple gong with a lump in the center. Both are struck with a wooden stick covered by cloth at one end or with bare hands.
Cồng Chiêng
Summary of Traditional Vietnamese Musical Instruments
It is impossible to list all Vietnamese musical instruments because there are as many as 54 ethnic groups in Vietnam. Each community has its own culture and lifestyle, and its own music. Most of these musical instruments and traditional Vietnamese music are dying out and only have a small audience. Nowadays, some are only appreciated as the country’s heritage and cultural symbols, while others are still sounding in musical performances.
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