Recognition: HCM City-based 75-year-old musician and music teacher Dương Thụ received the Phan Châu Trinh Awards 2018 Culture and Education prize for his contributions to research and to Vietnamese culture and music. (Photo.thethaovanhoa.com)

HCM CITY — The 2018 Phan Châu Trinh Awards in HCM City on Saturday recognised 75-year-old musician and music teacher Dương Thụ for his contributions to musical research and to Vietnamese culture and music.

The annual Phan Châu Trinh Awards, launched in 2008 by Phan Châu Trinh Culture Foundation, honour individuals and groups for their contributions to Vietnamese culture, translation, research and Vietnamese studies. Bearing the name of nationalist hero Phan Châu Trinh (1872 -1926), the awards aim to restore and spread defining cultural values to renew Vietnamese culture in 21st century.

Thụ received the Culture and Education prize. Thụ, who began his music career in 1982, has composed more than 100 songs in pop and contemporary folk music. Many of his works were top hits and have been performed by music stars. 

He has worked as a music lecturer at several universities and colleges in Hà Nội and HCM City.    

In 2009, Thụ launched Cà Phê Thứ Bẩy (Café Saturday), a cultural programme to introduce Vietnamese culture and music to young people.

His programme offers seminars and forums in fine art, literature, painting, photography, film and theatre. The events are hosted by well-known cultural researchers, musicians, writers and artists. 

Late culturist and scholar Phạm Quỳnh (1892-1945) was honoured at the 11th Phan Châu Trinh culture award ceremony late last week, held on March 24 at the Rex Hotel Saigon, District 1, HCM City. Quỳnh was honoured in the category of Vietnamese Man of Culture in modern day.

With this award, Quỳnh joins the ranks of five celebrated Vietnamese scholars on the list of Phan Châu Trinh Culture Foundation award winners: Trương Vĩnh Ký, Nguyễn Văn Vĩnh, Phan Bội Châu, Phan Châu Trinh and Phan Khôi.

Gifted: Late scholar Phạm Quỳnh. — Photo nongnghiep.vn

“Phạm Quỳnh is an outstanding and gifted person, having graduated at the top of Bảo Hộ School (Lycée du Protectorat) for mastering French and world history at the age of 16. In the same year, he was appointed youngest official of Viện Viễn Đông Bác Cổ Pháp (École française d’Extrême-Orient) and mastered Chinese characters afterward,” said writer Nghiêm Ngọc.

“As the editor in chief of Nam Phong newspaper, until the end of his time, he kept his routine regularly: studying, writing and working in front of the ancestor’s altar, so they watch over everything he thinks and does,” he continued.

On behalf of Phạm Quỳnh’s family, his son, musician Phạm Tuyên, accepted the award at the ceremony.

Other culture and education awards were given to Nhất Nghệ Tinh translating group and musician Dương Thụ and translator Nguyễn Tùng. The Vietnamese studies award was given to two French researchers, Daniel Hémery and Pierre Brocheux.

Film screenings of Vietnamese and famous foreign directors were also part of the programming.    

The Culture and Education prize was also shared with a group of book translators called Nhất Nghệ Tinh, who began their work in 2010 in Germany. They have released many books in education and technology for Vietnamese students and young people.

Translator Nguyễn Tùng received the Translation Prize for his work in anthropology.

The Research Prize was shared by Lữ Phương for his works on Marxism and Phan Cẩm Thượng for his works in Vietnamese folk culture. 

The Phan Châu Trinh awards also honour the national hero, poet and cultural expert Phan Châu Trinh, a native of central Quảng Nam Province.

Born in 1872, Trinh was a reformer who fought in the resistance movement against the French when he was very young. He devoted all of his life to the country’s modernisation cause.

The Phan Châu Trinh Culture Foundation is managed by the Việt Nam Union of Science and Technology Associations. — VNS