That only a small number of tickets to a recent show in Hanoi of singer Khanh Ly – known to Vietnamese music aficionados as the singer who sings songs by late maverick composer Trinh Cong Son the most beautifully – were sold has surprised many people.
After Khanh Ly’s live concert on August 2 at the Vietnam National Convention Center in Tu Liem District, news about the show being a failure in terms of revenue has been densely covered by local media.
It came as a big surprise when the concert did not see a large number of tickets sold and the 3,800-seat venue was not filled to capacity, while the veteran overseas Vietnamese singer had a sell-out show also in the capital city in May.
That May event was the 69-year-old singer’s first comeback in Vietnam after she left the country 39 years ago.
The failure of the August concert has become a topic of discussion on social networks and a number of reasons have been pointed out.
Timing is to blame first. Many explained that as locals were overexcited to see Khanh Ly’s first comeback, they were not very interested in watching another show by the singer only three months later.
Some even said they bought tickets to the August show because they just wanted to see other Vietnamese guest singers like Le Thu and Quang Dung.
Many social network users also said that the show organizers should have brought the concert to Ho Chi Minh City instead of Hanoi when Khanh Ly already had one a few months back.
Another reason, according to many netizens, is the ticket price. In the first show, audiences spent from VND900,000 (US$42.36) to VND3.5 million ($164.74) on a ticket, rather expensive for the Vietnamese music market.
So that is why not many people were willing to pay the same amount of money to enjoy another concert of the same singer only three months later, whereas there were many other shows in Hanoi at the same time.
Moreover, the music night was overshadowed by a copyright scandal. Right before the show, Vietnamese musician Pho Duc Phuong, director of the Vietnam Center for Protection of Music Copyright (VCPMC), demanded payments from the organizers for the rights to use some songs in the event.
According to Phuong, the concert organizers did not sign any contract with the center regarding the copyrights of the songs even though the VCPMC had sent a document on the issue to them 10 days before the show.
Tran Thi Truong, deputy director of the VCPMC, said singer Trinh Vinh Trinh, the younger sister and representative of late composer Trinh Cong Son (whose songs would be featured in Khanh Ly’s concert), has deputed the center to protect the composer’s song copyrights since 2009.
A representative of the show organizers, Dong Dao Entertainment Company, admitted that the company had difficulty in paying for the song copyrights because tickets did not sell as well as they had expected.
The issue finally ended up with a short meeting between the two sides only minutes before the concert began.
Dong Dao Entertainment Company then agreed to pay nearly VND200 million ($9,414) in song copyright fees.
Khanh Ly will give another concert in the central city of Da Nang on Friday.
| Khanh Ly began her singing career in Vietnam in 1962. Five years later, she met Trinh Cong Son, whose songs helped turn her into a legend in the local music arena for many years. Her fame remains intact during her years living abroad. Khanh Ly left Vietnam for the U.S. in 1975 when the country was reunified following the fall of the former Saigon regime. She was also one of the highest-paid and most sought-after overseas Vietnamese singers and has sung in several countries. In 2012, Khanh Ly received a license from the Department of Performing Arts under the Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism, allowing her to perform in Vietnam for the first time after nearly four decades. |
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