PAS Hosts Blues and Jazz Ambassador CoCo York

CoCo York’s brings down the house with her powerful opera voice

Internationally known blues and jazz singer CoCo York made a 9-day visit to Vietnam to perform in Hue and Ho Chi Minh City, from June 3-8. As one of the featured performers at Hue Festival 2008, CoCo York gave three evening performances in Hue. CoCo York performed her first two concerts at the Duyet Thi Duong Theatre, a small theatre inside the historic Hue Citadel, and the third concert, at An Dinh Palace, attracted more than 400 people. CoCo’s opera training paid off when, two songs into the first performance, an electrical outage left the theater in complete darkness!  Illuminated by the light of the audience members’ cell phones, CoCo’s powerful voice filled the theater as she and saxophonist Tran Manh Tuan developed a new song list on the spot and performed their full show in darkness, to the delight of an international audience. During her time in Hue, she also conducted a master class on vocal techniques with more than 50 students of the Hue Academy of Music. After performing a short impromptu set at the Sax N’ Art Jazz Club on June 7, CoCo closed out her Vietnam tour with a show at the Ho Chi Minh City Conservatory of Music on the night of June 8.