I attended the Korean Percussion Ensemble Concert on April 2. Because we had great, sunny weather, the concert took place outdoors which helped it become more casual and interactive with the audience. As someone of Korean descent, I really enjoyed the performance. I had previously learned about traditional Korean music performance in a previous course I had taken, but it was my first time actually witnessing a performance.
The concert started off with a seated performance called “pungmulnori” and, like how Korean traditional music is, it involved a lot of awareness or rhythm and beats which allowed the players to play around the beats. I was surprised to see the variety of instruments however, as I had assumed there would only be janggus, as I was informed that this was a Korean drumming course. There were a variety of percussion instruments, ranging from traditional drums to traditional symbols. The first piece started off at a slow pace and slowly built up to a much faster one, representative of traditional pungmulnori.
The concert then progressed to samulnori in which the pieces are performed standing. The performance was very interactive as we were also told how we can participate to be a part of the performance. The conductor taught us all short words or phrases such as “jota” or “ulssu” as words that we can say to follow along when the players say them. The performance was very different than the other ones I had seen this semester as there was a lot of physical movement as part of the performance that aided to set the tone of the music. The songs were all very upbeat and lively, usually starting off slow and building a big, round sound altogether. The textures were mostly monophonic as there weren’t several melodies, but rather a single melody that increases in intensity and sound.
From my understanding of the course, it is intended for beginners so many of the students had never had any prior experience with Korean traditional drums. Because of this, I was so impressed by the level of performance that they were able to display. Many of the students even had multiple instruments that they were assigned to, so I think it was fascinating to see how much talent we have at our school, both the students that were in the class, and the professor that lead those students. Something that I was even more impressed by was that the professor of the course was actually a student that was a performer in the concert I attended the day before for another grad school-level class.
Overall, I really enjoyed the concert as it was a form of traditional art that I had learned of, but only got to really experience today. I definitely recommend seeing the rest of the World Music Week at UBC, and consider even taking the class if it fits your schedule next year.