Hannah Hà, Mark Gergis, Jan Hagenkoetter & the Making of 'Magical Nights'

Saigoneer Podcast

This special episode builds on our recent article about the creation of 'Magical Nights - Saigon Surf Twist & Soul,' the recently released album of Phương Tâm's songs from the early 1960s. Hannah Hà, Mark Gergis and Jan Hagenkoetter were the driving force behind the album - Hannah, Tâm's daughter, shares how she learned about her mother's past as a rockstar singer in 1960s Saigon - a previous life that no one in her family knew about. The trio also discuss how they connected, the arduous process of tracking down physical copies of Tâm's music during the first year of the pandemic, the delicate work of bringing her songs to life on 'Magical Nights,' and the importance of bringing Vietnamese voices to music from the 1960s. The audio quality on this episode isn't up to our usual standards, as this is a phone recording of a Zoom call that wasn't planned for the podcast, but we think this is worth sharing as a companion to the website feature, which can be found here: https://saigoneer.com/saigon-music-art/20780-what-to-do-when-you-discover-that-your-mom-was-a-superstar-singer-in-1960s-saigon Happy holidays from the Saigoneer Podcast team!