Published:  00:00 Tuesday - March 23, 2010

The second Cracking Bamboo music festival is being held at Hanoi’s Goethe Institute drawing about 60 musicians from around the world from March 22 to April 3.

Cracking Bamboo aims to musically unify East and West, creating a platform for encounters between percussionists with modern European and traditional Asian instruments.

Meeting in Hanoi will be musicians from China, Norway, Turkey, the Republic of Korea, Cambodia, Malaysia, Denmark, Switzerland, India, Canada, Spain, Indonesia, France, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany and Vietnam.

The two-day opening concert has taken place in the courtyard of the Goethe Institute.

The musicians are divided into three mixed ensemble groups to create new works during the two-week festival at the Vietnam National Academy of Music (VNAM).

Directing the rehearsals are a number of artistic tutors, experienced in working on improvisation and cooperative projects, who have successfully demonstrated their ability to integrate diverse ensembles. They will be working with the participants to form the artistic backbone of the programme.

The musicians will be conducted by German Bernhard Wulff, who is professor with University of Music and artistic director of the Percussion Ensemble in Freiberg, Germany. He is a co-founder of Two Days and Two Nights of New Music festival in Ukraine; Roaring Hoofs festival in Mongolia; Golden Silk Sound Road in the central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan and Cracking Bamboo in Vietnam.

Vietnamese musicians will be present in the form of percussion group Fireworks from the VNAM; six from HCM City and contemporary musician Kim Ngoc. These young artists will be given the opportunities to participate in a dialogue with musicians from other countries.

A concert will be performed at the Hanoi Opera House on Saturday and Sunday featuring a programme comprised of solo contributions, improvisation and short composition resulting from the working time of the groups. There will be a piece performed by al the musicians.

After Hanoi, the groups will travel to Indonesia to perform and take part in musical exchanges. They will return to HCM City for a performance at the HCM City Conservatory on April 3.

The performance will begin at 8 pm and be free of charge. Tickets can be picked up at the Goethe Institute in Hanoi and in HCM City.