Trinh Cong Son and his failed wedding with a Japanese girl

Trinh Cong Son's love affair with Japanese girl Michiko Yoshii was a beautiful love affair but had a sad ending, lingering like the immortal love songs of the talented late musician.

On April 1, 2001, musician Trinh Cong Son - one of the greatest musicians of contemporary Vietnamese music - left this temporary world for eternity. Over the past 15 years, his songs have echoed everywhere, still being a spiritual stream that waters the souls of many generations of Vietnamese people who love Trinh's music.

In his musical legacy, Trinh Cong Son left behind immortal love songs. Those love songs are sometimes pure, innocent, and pristine like the ever-fragrant night-blooming cereus in the garden of love, and many times they are just sadness, loss, and unfinished, "each lover leaves us like a small river". In his own love life, the late musician sometimes hovered on the threshold of marriage but never crossed it. There were women, people who passed through Trinh Cong Son's life and they remained in his songs, poems, and paintings like pure sadness.

Musician Trinh Cong Son. Photo archive.

Michiko Yoshii - a smart, talented and innocent Japanese girl is such a sad and pure love story of Trinh Cong Son. Overcoming barriers of borders, language and culture, she came into his life as a soul mate. It was thought that the relationship would be a fateful one, but in the end it did not work out, leaving only a gentle and beautiful love.

Around the late 1980s, Michiko Yoshii - then a university student in Paris (France) - fell in love with Vietnam because of her love for the culture, language and people of this country. One of the greatest loves of the Japanese girl at that time was her deep affection for Trinh Cong Son's music. Michiko loved Trinh's music so much that, at that time, even though she already had a master's degree in Japanese culture, she continued to pursue her master's thesis on Trinh Cong Son's anti-war music.

To get closer to Trinh's music, Michiko not only called Vietnam many times from France to talk to Trinh Cong Son, she also came to Vietnam to meet the musician she admired in person. Her master's thesis and music were the bridge for their gentle love story.

Although they cannot remember exactly when their love became deeper, the late musician's family members still remember the excitement when they heard the news that the two were getting married.

Trinh Cong Son's three younger sisters who were in Canada at the time, including singer Trinh Vinh Trinh, Dieu and Tam, eagerly went shopping for their brother's wedding. They chose a beautiful suit for him and sent good fabric back to Vietnam for their mother to make ao dai. At home, Trinh Cong Son's beloved mother was very happy. She was busy shopping and preparing for the wedding ceremony according to Vietnamese customs. The wedding rings were also carefully prepared, just waiting for the day for the bride and groom to exchange them.

At that time, Michiko said that because her parents were very old and could not come to Vietnam, she wanted to ask the Japanese ambassador to Vietnam to replace her parents and represent the bride's family on the day the two sides met. According to Japanese wedding customs, the ambassador and his wife had to sit down so that Trinh Cong Son and Michiko could kneel down and pay their respects. Trinh Cong Son did not agree to this because his mother had never knelt down in her entire life, so there was no way he would kneel down before the Japanese ambassador and his wife.

"I'm not sure how it all ended, because I was in Canada at the time. But when we heard that the wedding was canceled, everyone was very sad. There could have been many other reasons, but Son and Michiko are both discreet, profound and delicate by nature, so the story was rarely talked about. Through my feelings and perspective, I think Son was very touched at that time that a foreign girl understood and loved his music so much. He was very impressed when Michiko knew hundreds of his songs. I remember around 1992, Son, Nguyen Quang Sang and I were invited to France and attended a program. That was the time I saw Michiko - a slim, graceful Japanese girl. She hugged the guitar and sang many Trinh songs passionately and emotionally, which moved everyone," singer Trinh Vinh Trinh said.

Their love affair in real life was unfinished before marriage, but music was always the bond that connected two souls in harmony. In July 1991, in Paris, Michiko Yoshii successfully defended her master's thesis on the influence of Trinh Cong Son's anti-war music on Vietnamese society during the war. This thesis was rated excellent by the examiners of the University of Paris VII. And that slender Japanese girl always left an impression on everyone with the image of a guitar singing Trinh Cong Son's love songs with eyes filled with sadness.

After Trinh Cong Son passed away, Michiko Yoshii often returned to burn incense for him. As for a talented person with a deep and discreet nature like Trinh Cong Son, he poured his feelings into his works. Trinh Cong Son composed a song dedicated to Michiko. This piece of music has never been published and is currently kept in the family's private glass cabinet among the late musician's unpublished songs and poems in French and Vietnamese.

Musician Trinh Cong Son with his youngest sister Trinh Vinh Trinh.

On March 31, amidst the hustle and bustle of preparing for the 15th anniversary of Trinh Cong Son's death, Trinh Vinh Trinh took a moment to remember his beloved eldest brother.

One of the memories the sisters in the family often mention about Trinh Cong Son is the soft knocking sound of him knocking on their door in the middle of the night. Trinh Cong Son was a thin and frail man, so the sound of his footsteps and the knocking on the door was also very gentle. Every time he asked "Are you asleep yet?", the sisters - even though they were sleepy at the time, because they loved him, still chirped "No, we were just sitting and talking, just turned off the light to sleep." At times like that, he would gently invite one of his sisters to come downstairs to pose for his portrait. And late at night, under the light, there was only the rustling sound of his brush on the canvas, his thin figure was printed on the easel.

"All of my brothers and I were scared and heartbroken when we saw our brother lonely. We didn't know what to do to make him happy. Usually at noon, many friends came to see him, so it was better. But at night, especially at 2-3am, when everyone was sleeping the most, I guess, that was probably the time when loneliness invaded him the most. Once at 3am, he still called writer Nguyen Quang Sang. A while later, Sang rode his motorbike to his house to talk with him. Son was a very tactful person, he never bothered others and only called close friends when he needed them the most," Trinh Vinh Trinh said.

According to VNE