Spring Awakening
Music of Youth And Hope
Excerpt from Demon for Cello and Gayageum
composed by Do Yeon Kim
Excerpts from My Funny Valentine
arranged by Chase Morrin for vocal, cello and piano
Kinderszenen, Op. 15 VII. Träumerei
by Robert Schumann
Scenes from the Concert
Performers
Yu Mi Bae is a classically trained cellist. She started cello at the age of eight, making her debut as a soloist with the Hyundai Youth orchestra and the Bright Bows Ensemble of Russia at the age of twelve. Besides being a superb soloist with refined sound and techniques, she also participated in chamber ensembles such as Hwaum Boston String Orchestra, Haffner Sinfonietta, Boston Accompanietta and Ensemble Rose. She has been invited to the Busan Music Festival, the workshop with the Royal Academy of Music in London, Eum Yeon Music Festival and Beaux Arts Trio Music Academy, where she performed in the final concert. Recently, she was the featured soloist with the Boston University Symphony Orchestra. Her mentors include Hyejeong Chang, Byeonghun Park, and Huichul Chae at Sookmyung Women’s University where she received Honor’s scholarship during her four years there as an undergraduate. She holds a Masters of Performing Arts from Boston University School of Fine Arts. This summer, she is finishing the Doctor of Musical Arts program under the guidance of Michael Reynolds.
Since the age of 12, Boston-based gayageum performer Do Yeon Kim has dreamt of introducing Korean traditional music to the international stage. She is the first gayageum player admitted to the New England Conservatory, where she currently studies Contemporary Improvisation under Hankus Netsky. Her graduate studies at NEC provide the opportunity to increase her understanding of all types of music, and to compose and perform music incorporating Korean folk music and other World Music styles. In both 2009 and 2011, Do Yeon received the Gold Prize in gayageum sponsored by the National Center for Korean Traditional Performing Arts, one of the most prestigious awards in Korea. In addition to a number of other prizes, she was also awarded the 2009 Gold Prize in the Dong-A Ilbo Traditional Music Competition. Experienced in both traditional Korean music and modern works alike, Do Yeon has played several of her own solo recitals in Korea, and performed alongside composer John Zorn himself in a 2014 concert of Zorn’s music at New York City’s “The Stone”. The Boston Museum of Fine Arts invited her to play in the “Lunar New Year Music Performance” in February, 2015. In 2008, Do Yeon was chosen by the Korean Department of Culture as one of the few gayageum musicians in the Seoul Youth Delegation tour of Japan. She has worked with many living composers and performed several world premieres, and has also been invited as a guest lecturer on gayageum and Korean Music at Emmanuel College and Brandeis University. A graduate of the National Traditional Music High School, Do Yeon received top honors upon her graduation from Seoul National University’s College of Music in 2014. She is a protégé of living gayageum master Yi Jiyoung.
Classically trained pianist, Clera Ryu is an active collaborator in both vocal and instrumental repertoire in New England region, working closely with award-winning musicians from Baroque to contemporary compositions. She is currently finishing up her Doctoral studies in Collaborative Piano at Boston University where she received full scholarship and works as assistant to the department. Previously, she was awarded fellowship to earn Professional Artist Certificate at the North Carolina School of the Arts focusing on instrumental chamber music, specifically piano trio. Clera was a recital winner of the Georgia All State Competitions, as well as outstanding performer prizewinner from the GA Music Teachers Association, and she has appeared as soloist performing Shostakovich’s second piano concerto in Athens, GA. Besides working as a freelance pianist and repetiteur in various colleges in the area, Clera is the accompanist for the BU Symphonic Chorus, Boston Childrens Chorus, and Wellesley College Choir. The past summers, she joined the faculty as vocal coach in the Young Artist Vocal Program at the BU Tanglewood Institute as well as the Franco American Vocal Academy in France.
Wonmi Jung is a songwriter from South Korea. Her unique interpretation of music is informed by the distinctive style and diverse musical background. As a child, Wonmi’s artistic outlet centered around painting and poetry. At age 15, she won the grand prize for poetry at the Lake Art Youth Festival, a writing contest in South Korea. She went to Seoul Music High School, then Musicians Institute in Los Angeles. There she worked on Pop music, and musical theater. Wonmi is studying at New England Conservatory with mentors Dominique Eade, Frank Carlberg, Ran Blake, Hankus Netsky, Jeannie Lovetri, Kate McGarry and recently with Miguel Zenon, John McNeil and Ken Schaphorst. This year, she is focusing on setting music to poems.
Chase Morrin, 23, composer, arranger and pianist from San Diego, graduated from Harvard May of 2015, earning a B.S. in Computer Science and a minor in Neurobiology, and from New England Conservatory (M.M.), 2016. Chase currently attends the Global Jazz Institute at Berklee College of Music and has garnered accolades including four ASCAP Young Jazz Composer awards, nine DownBeat awards in composition, arranging and performance, five film scoring and composition awards through the Music Teachers’ Association of California (MTAC) and the Young Composers’ Guild, and (YCG) Yamaha Young Performing Artist. Chase recently premiered his own piano concerto with the Louisville Orchestra. When he is not on piano, he is also a proficient programmer in Python, C, PHP, Java and Ocaml, among others. You can find more information at www.chasemorrin.com.
About the Program
SPRING AWAKENING
Notes on the Program
What kind of music does ring in your ears when you think of “Spring”? If you are a Baroque fan, Vivaldi’s famous melody may reach you already. Beethoven’s Spring sonata would then follow. Numerous lieder by Schubert, Schumann and Brahms touch on aspects of Spring one way or the other. Moving on toward the modern era, how about Delius’ “On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring” for the Idylls of Welsh meadow, or Copland’s Appalachian Spring that captures the serenity and vigor of the Spring like no other? More adventuresome listener would advocate Piazzolla’s Primavera Porteña (Spring of Buenos Aires) or Ned Rorem’s luminous chamber piece, “Spring Music”. Every Korean knows and probably sang at some point in life the popular art song “봄이 오면” (When the Spring arrives…). Byung Ki Hwang, the famous gayageum player and composer had composed a beautiful gayageum suite named “Spring Snow” (춘설). Would it be a stretch to mention Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring too?
Good. But you will not be hearing those pieces this evening. Maybe some other time, when the Spring has unconditionally arrived…(and when we have more resource!)
The titles of the five pieces in Hwang’ suite capture what we would like this Spring turn out to be: Morning Calm - Serene - Mysterious - Jestful - Exhilarating. These beautiful words resonate in our heart achingly because we are still reeling from the blows that this past year dealt us, as anyone glued to the news from Korea and in the US would agree. For Korean people, nominally, yes, it is finally a hopeful time - yet the true Spring as elicited by Hwang’s titles seems still out of reach; the on-going assaults on the Climates, the Arts, the Sciences, and the common sense test our long-held beliefs, patience and the will to persevere. When we laugh, it is not a good, hearty laugh - but rather a hollow giggle of the cynic who cannot help but despise “the other”.
So, this evening, we would like to take a musical journey of a lifetime, looking back through the Spring of our lives. All of the pieces performed today are works by young composers in their 20s and early 30s. Naturally, the spirit of the pieces are vibrant rather than jaded, yet some tinted with the loneliness in a foreign land. Innocence and yearning, noble idealism side by side with despair and inner turmoils of growing up, and finally mature understanding of love. Hopefully, what we find there will help us weather the Spring showers that lurk somewhere in the azure May sky.
봄이 오면
프로그램에 관한 짧은 생각
“봄” 하면 무슨 음악이 떠 오르나요? 클래식 음악을 좋아하시면 당장 비발디가 귀에 울리겠고, 곧 이어 베토벤의 스프링 소나타가 따르겠지요. 슈베르트, 슈만 그리고 브람스가 쓴 많은 가곡들 역시 봄의 이런 저런 모습을 다루고 있습니다. 우리 가까운 시대로 오면 영국의 평화로운 초원을 눈에 선히 그려주는 들리우스의 “봄에 첫 뻐꾸기 소리를 들으면서” 라든가 봄의 평온함과 생동감을 너무 잘 잡아낸 코플랜드의 아팔래치안 봄을 빠뜨릴 수 없지요. 음악을 여기 저기 쑤시고 다니는 분이라면 피아졸라의 사계중 봄, 그리고 네드 로렘의 트리오곡 “봄 음악”을 떠 올리실 수도 있고. 우리 한국인이라면 물론 “봄이 오면 산에 들에 진달래 피고…” 하는 가곡을 다 흥얼거리기도 할 것입니다. 한국의 유명한 가야금 연주자이자 작곡가이신 황병기 선생의 “춘설”이란 곡도 있지요. 여기에 스트라빈스키의 봄의 제전까지 들먹이는 건 좀 무리일까요?
좋아요. 그런데 오늘 음악회에서는 이 곡들을 들으시진 않을 것입니다. 아마도 언젠가 봄이 완연히 오는 그 때를 기약해야겠죠. 저희가 여력도 더 있어야 준비 가능 하구요.
황병기선생의 조곡 ‘춘설’을 이루는 짧은 다섯 곡의 제목들은 우리가 진정 봄이 이랬으면 하고 원하는 모습을 잘 담고 있어요: 조용한 아침, 평온, 신비, 우스꽝스러움, 그리고 신남. 이 아름다운 단어들이 마음속에 좀 아프게 와 닿는 이유는 미국이나 한국 모두 뉴스를 지켜봐오신 분이면 아시는 지난해 우리를 지치게 한 그 여러 일들 때문이지요. 한국 사람들에게는, 물론, 드디어 희망이 보이는 계절이라고도 할 수 있겠어요. 그렇지만 위 다섯 단어들이 온전히 묻어나는 봄은 아직 멀리 있는 듯 합니다. 계속 진행되는 환경, 문화, 과학, 그리고 우리의 상식에 대한 폭력적인 공세 때문에 우리의 오랜 믿음은 약해지고 참을성은 세어 나가고 버틸 힘도 더 이상 없다 싶어지지 않나요? 웃음이 나올 때도 있지만 이는 진정 우스운 일에 대한 담소가 아니라, 어떻게 해 볼수 없는 상대방에 대한 경멸로 물든 자조인 경우가 많지는 않은지요?
그래서 오늘 저녁에는 여러분들과 음악을 통하여 인생 역정을 거슬러 올라가 우리 인생의 봄 날을 돌아보려고 합니다. 오늘 연주되는 곡들은 모두 작곡가가 젊은 시절, 즉 그들 커리어의 봄에 작곡한 작품들입니다. 피곤함보단 풋풋함이 있고, 또 한편 이국 땅에서의 외로움도 있고. 어린이의 동경, 청년의 고매한 기상이 있는가 하면 마음속의 demon과의 치열한 싸움, 그리고 성숙한 사랑의 의미를 이미 찾은 듯한 모습도 볼 수 있지요. 바라건데, 거기서 다시 발견하는 그 무언가가, 청명한 오월의 봄 하늘 어느 구석엔가 숨어 있다 닥칠 봄 소나기들을 잘 견뎌 나가게 도와 주겠지요.