Cuong Vu

Cuong Vu (1969-     ) is a Grammy Award winning jazz musician and singer.  Born in Saigon, Cuong Vu with his family left Vietnam for the United States in 1975 and resettled in Bellevue, Washington, a suburb right outside Seattle.  He began playing the trumpet at the age of 11 after he had been given one as a birthday gift from his mother that year.  After graduating from high school, Cuong Vu left Washington for the East Coast to attend the prestigious New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts where he would earn his bachelor's degree in jazz studies.

Upon completing his studies, in 1994 Cuong Vu relocated to New York City where he would form his first band as co-leader called Ragged Jack with three other friends.  The band would go on to earn momentum around New York City's downtown music scene and three years later, Cuong Vu and fellow bandmember, Jamie Saft, would record an album also entitled Ragged Jack released by the Japanese label, Avant.  Cuong Vu has released a total of eight recordings and has toured extensively all over the globe.

Among some of the top musicians that Cuong Vu has worked with include David Bowie, Laurie Anderson, Myra Melford, Dave Douglas, Gerry Hemingway and Mitchell Froom.  He has won several major awards in the music industry.  In 2003, Cuong Vu was awarded with a Grammy for his work on the Pat Metheny Group's album, Speaking of Now, for best contemporary jazz album of 2002, making him the first Vietnamese-American to have won this prestigious award.  That same honor would be repeated three years later for Cuong Vu's work also with the Pat Metheny Group on another album, The Way Up (2005).  Also in 2006, Cuong Vu was named as the Best International Jazz Artist by the Italian Jazz Critics' Society.


In recent years, Cuong Vu has returned to his former home state of Washington and now takes up residence in Seattle where he is an associate professor of jazz studies at the University of Washington.  In 2015, Cuong Vu performed with accomplished French-born jazz musician Nguyen Le on several scores featured on volumes 114 and 115 of the popular overseas Vietnamese live show video series, Paris By Night, produced by Thuy Nga.

Link(s):

Cuong Vu Official Website