Jazz nights at Binh Minh Jazz Club

   Every night, in a lane beside the Hanoi Opera House, live jazz starts up again: standards and Latin jazz sit side by side with Vietnamese songs arranged as jazz. The club was founded by saxophonist Quyen Van Minh (Quyền Văn Minh), often called a legend of Vietnamese jazz — if you want to hear jazz with a Vietnamese accent, this is the place to start.

   According to the history on the club's own website, it opened in October 1997 at the Giảng Võ Exhibition Centre and calls itself Vietnam's first jazz club; it has moved several times since. Its founder is a Meritorious Artist (NSƯT), a saxophonist and composer who taught himself jazz saxophone and set up the saxophone department at the Hanoi Conservatory (now the Vietnam National Academy of Music). For years he played at his club with his own students; his son, Quyen Thien Dac (Quyền Thiện Đắc), is a saxophonist too.

   What the evenings cover:
standards and traditional jazz
Latin jazz
funk and blues
Vietnamese songs in jazz arrangements

   It suits anyone who wants live jazz in central Hanoi on any night of the week without planning around a listings page, and anyone curious about what happens when jazz meets Vietnamese melody.

   Music plays daily, Monday to Sunday, from 21:00 to 23:15. The price shown is the club's live jazz cover charge, paid per guest.

   The club sits in the lane between the Opera House and Highlands Coffee.

   Tables can be booked by phone; the club's second number is 024 3933 6555, and the email is [email protected].

   Come before nine, take a table near the stage and let the jazz set the course of the evening.