Music night «Dành Cho Em» (For You) at Thoáng Acoustic

   Friday in Hanoi usually means the loud bars of the Old Quarter, yet a couple of minutes away the week closes the opposite way — with quiet love songs over voice and keyboard. This is the option for anyone who needs silence more than a dance floor by the end of the week.

   The evening runs under the title «Dành Cho Em», meaning «for you». The programme is described as whispered, sweet songs about love, put together to lift the strain of the last working day. Two musicians carry the evening: vocalist Việt Cường and keyboard player Tú Đinh.

   The Thoáng Acoustic schedule works by the week: a programme for seven evenings goes up in advance, each with its own genre and theme, from saxophone instrumentals to Chinese pop. Friday in that grid is consistently given to the Vietnamese ballad.

   It makes sense to come as a pair or a small group that would rather talk than shout over the music. The Drop In café downstairs and the bar upstairs let you start with dinner and stay for the set without changing address.

   For a quiet end to the working week the conditions here line up about as well as they can.