Eurodisco star Gina T is performing Friday, November 12th at the Club 740 in Downtown, Los Angeles in a concert sponsored by Keep On Music (KOM), an organization committed to preserving and spotlighting Italo/Eurodisco — often aka Vietnamese New Wave.
Gina T is a gold and platinum singer as well as songwriter for other artists. She was born Gina Tielman on October 24, in Bussum, Noord-Holland, Netherlands to Indonesian parents. Music runs in her family; a grandfather, an uncle and her father, Ponthon, were members at various times of The Tielman Brothers, an amazing Indorock band.
Her mother, Joyce, was also a famous singer and her brother Nino (aka Mr. Double T) was involved in T’N’T Partyzone, Die Kranken Schwestern and Culture Beat.
Gina began her professional music career as one-third of Rising Sun, who released two singles, “Kumbaja” b/w “Rising Sun” and “Atlantis Town” in 1982.
She debuted as a solo artist in 1989 with the beautiful “In My Fantasy,” which Gina T co-wrote with Adam Schairer (her husband), Herbert Falenti and Peter Hermann.
In 1990, she followed with two more hits, “Hey Angel” and another classic, the urgent “Tokyo By Night,” which she again co-wrote with Hermann and Shairer. Her final releases in her singles era were “You Really Got Me” and “Tonight’s So Cold.” She made her full-length debut with The Window of My Heart (1992 Bellaphon). Gina T has kept a lower profile since then but her music was kept alive, largely by the Vietnamese-American community through programs like Paris By Night, such as this J-Pop-style cover by Trish Thuy Trang.
She currently resides in Naples, Florida with her husband. Together they have a daughter, Vanity. Last night she played her first ever concert in California, in Santa Clara. Southern Californians, don’t miss this rare opportunity when she comes to LA!
Check out this video of Gina T with the KOM crew and her performance in Santa Clara:
Eric Brightwell is an adventurer, essayist, rambler, explorer, cartographer, and guerrilla gardener who is always seeking paid writing, speaking, traveling, and art opportunities. He is not interested in generating advertorials, cranking out clickbait, or laboring away in a listicle mill “for exposure.”
Brightwell has written for Angels Walk LA, Amoeblog, Boom: A Journal of California, diaCRITICS, Hidden Los Angeles, and KCET Departures. His art has been featured by the American Institute of Architects, the Architecture & Design Museum, the Craft Contemporary, Form Follows Function, Los Angeles County Store, the book Sidewalking, Skid Row Housing Trust, and 1650 Gallery. Brightwell has been featured as subject in The Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Magazine, LAist, CurbedLA, Eastsider LA, Boing Boing, Los Angeles, I’m Yours, and on Notebook on Cities and Culture. He has been a guest speaker on KCRW‘s Which Way, LA?, at Emerson College, and the University of Southern California.
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