Since I was a kid, my father tried to teach me playing trumpet without
success. :-) Cause I didn't like trumpet at all .-)
1981: In Lam Son (near Ba` Ri.a) I saw and touched the guitar for the first
time in my life when I visited my neighbour. I played "Ave Maria" with
only
one string (I can still remember that it was B-string, hihihi). In June 1981, I
left Vietnam by boat and came to Kuku, and then Galang in Indonesia. In Galang I
heard many lovely Vietnamese songs like Ngu+o+`i O+? La.i Charlie, Em
Hie^`n Nhu+ Ma Soeur etc.
1982: Dec. 1982 I came to Norway.
1984: I was "deadly" in love with guitar and started to take guitar lessions.
Lo`ng Me. is the first song I learned to play (only notes, not
accords).
1985: Bought my first classic guitar. And at school I learned histories about Mozart,
Bach, Bethoveen, Schubert, Grieg etc. And of course much about Rock &
Roll and Blues: The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Jimmy Hendrix, Eric Clapton,
Bob Marley, Bob Dylan, B.B. King, Ike Turner, John Lee Hooker and many more.
And in this year, 1985, I joined "Ca DDoa`n Trinh Vu+o+ng Junior" in
Oslo. Here I took music theory lessions and learned how to sing, and I learned
much theory at home from my father too.
1986: Was in love with piano, but without success. And I realized that guitar
was my favorite instrument.
1987: Joined the band "Gio' Mu`a", a Vietnamese church band.
1988: I quited Gio' Mu`a, and the rock band "LAST WILL" was borned from
the idea of our Norwegian music teacher (Svein) and ourself.
The members of LAST WILL:
- Bass & vocal: Tommy Ødegård
- Drum: Patrick Saur
- Synthesizer & vocal: Espen Gran
- Guitar & vocal: Pham-Duc Thang
When I was a member of Last Will, I came in contact with many other rock bands
in Norway. It was this time I learned much about how to play Rock and Blues. We
practiced together at least 3 times a week, and every time lasted min. 3-4
hours. We composed our own songs and my first song was "Tine" (Tine is a
Norwegian girlname, I wrote this song to Tommy Ødegård when he was lovesick
with Tine). My Norwegian companions and I were happy, cause we earned some
moneys too ! And we thought we were the champions of the world. hihi, why ? We
were just kids by that time, you know.
1990: Everything good has always an end. In summer 1990 we said good bye to LAST
WILL. And I said good bye to my guitar, Gibson. By that time, I was really tired
of playing guitar, and I concentrated on school.
1995: I left Oslo, student in Trondheim. Computer science.
1997-2000: In 1997, my friend Vinh encouraged me to play guitar again. And I did
it ! Since 1997 I've played guitar in "one man band", usually just to keep
my life as a student going on. .-). But the feeling to get back on stage
has not come back. And today I wish I can play guitar as well as I did in
1990, but it seems that it will take a long time .-) But I'm coming back !
Trondheim, Norway, January 2000
Pham-Duc Thang
2001-2007: Too busy with my job. No more guitar.
2007-2008: I bought a second hand Takamine TF341DLX in June 2007, and started playing a
little.
2009-2010: A new Martin D-28 in Christmas 2008. And from Mars 2009 I practice
guitar 2-3
hours
every week. This is the first time since 1989, I can feel the music is running in my blood.
:-)