laughs, and inspiration. You are my family. Thank you to Kim Stoker, Su-Yoon Ko, Krys Lee, Tammy Chu, Sora Kim-Russell, Linda Kwon, Mihee Nathalie Lemoine, and Andrew Park. My Tokyo homestay parents—Yukiko and Shigeo Katsuoka—welcomed a stranger into their home and gained an adoptive daughter. I can never repay you for your generosity and kindness. And to Sindhu Revuluri: this book is a testament to your faith in me and this project.
Lastly, I reserve my deepest gratitude for my parents. It was only after I had lived in South Korea as an adult that I became aware of their courage and the sacrifices made in order to chart a new path as immigrants in America. They have been my strongest advocates, and for that, I am immeasurably blessed.
On a final note, my father, John Jonghyo Lee, has been a silent partner in this project from the beginning of my graduate studies. When my Korean language skills faltered, when I needed assistance with tracking down resources, or when I was overwhelmed with life’s challenges, he has always been there for me. In many ways, he has learned much more about samul nori and Korean music than he ever could have imagined. I also believe that he is the only retired research engineer who can now sing the entire “Pinari” if prompted. In the eleventh hour he provided additional Chinese-language support on the “Pinari” (Sino-Korean version of the text) that appears in appendix 1. It joys me to know that his countless hours of research are now inscribed in this manuscript.
NOTES ON TRANSLATION AND ROMANIZATION
Korean words are rendered according to the McCune-Reischauer system of romanization. Two terms that figure prominently in this work—samul nori and SamulNori—will refer to the genre and the name of the quartet, respectively. Since copyright issues and cases of mistaken identity have plagued the SamulNori percussion quartet from its inception, I have made a conscious decision to respect these orthographic preferences (over samullori and Samulnori), in addition to adopting the quartet’s English rendering of names such as those of SamulNori Hanullim’s artistic director, Kim Duk Soo [Kim Tŏksu / 김덕수], and managing director Joo Jay-youn [Chu Chaeyŏn / 주재연]. In these cases, I generally provide the McCune-Reischauer spelling in brackets at their first appearance in the text. Other more standard exceptions to the McCune-Reischauer system include a decision to retain the more familiar romanization of historical figures and place names, such as Park Chung Hee [Pak Chŏnghŭi / 박정희] and Seoul [Sŏul / 서울], as well as the names of Korean authors who publish predominantly in English. Korean names are written with the family name preceding the given name. In the bibliography, author’s names appear with the romanizations used in the original publications. When necessary, I include the McCune-Reischauer rendering in brackets for clarity.
The names of specific SamulNori compositions, such as “Yŏngnam nongak” and “Pinari,” will appear in quotations. Terms such as kil kunak and pan kil kunak (italicized and in lowercase) will refer to the name of particular rhythmic patterns. Korean and Japanese terms generally appear in italics on first appearance in the text. For clarity, some less commonly used Korean terms appear in italics on first appearance in a chapter.
Unless otherwise noted, all translations (Korean to English; Japanese to English) are my own.
Dynamic Korea and Rhythmic Form
INTRODUCTION
Hip-hop. Gamelan. Taiko. Samul nori. These are just a handful of musical genres that have become truly global in the past century. Not only are these musics enjoyed by diverse audiences; they are regularly performed in locales that may have little or no connection to the genre’s country of origin. While cross-cultural musical interaction is neither novel nor surprising, the widespread transmission of these genres to musical communities around the world beginning in the late twentieth century is nonetheless remarkable. This phenomenon has often been explained by some of globalization’s grandest narratives—Westernization, neoliberalism, and the widespread diffusion of media technologies.
But what makes one form of music go global and another one stay relatively put? And what compels people with limited musical training to actually learn how to perform music that may be culturally distant from them? Lastly, what are some of the mechanisms that facilitate the pedagogical transmission of a musical practice, across cultural and national boundaries? Dynamic Korea explores these questions through the lens of a South Korean percussion genre called samul nori. First created in Seoul in 1978, samul nori (which translates simply into “four things play”) is a neo-traditional musical repertory that features the use of four different percussion instruments. Since the 1980s, the drum-and-gong-based genre has been performed on many international stages by professional ensembles. It also holds the distinction of having been transmitted to amateur musical communities around the world. Samul nori is performed by musical groups in Korean diasporic communities and also in places where a connection to Korea is limited or unexpected, such as Mexico City and Basel, Switzerland. Like other expressive forms that have “gone global,” samul nori has been uneven in its charted movement, with certain pathways tread more frequently than others because of proximity (Seoul to Osaka, Japan), ethnic ties (Los Angeles and Berlin), or idiosyncratic reasons (Paris). But even despite this asymmetry, samul nori is undeniably a genre that has traveled far and wide. It is actively practiced outside the country of its origin.
With its transmission abroad and regular appearances on international stages, samul nori is regarded as an important sonic and cultural symbol of South Korea. The prolific scholar of Korean music Keith Howard proclaimed that by 1994 samul nori “was firmly established as an icon of Korean identity and was arguably the most popular genre of traditional music both at home and abroad” (2006, 2). Samul nori, in fact, precedes the trendier “K-pop” genre as one of South Korea’s successful musical exports. One could argue that it was the first ripple in what would later become known as the Korean Wave.1 And although it is rooted in much older musical traditions that date back to a unified Korean peninsula, samul nori is a genre of music that is a quintessentially South Korean creation.
Dynamic Korea is animated by the question of how samul nori became a global music genre. In this book, I argue that samul nori’s rhythmic form has served as a critical site for cross-cultural musical encounters and its global journeys. This rhythm-based form has helped to draw in international fans with little prior knowledge of traditional Korean music or even of South Korea. Additionally, it has aided enthusiasts on their path to the actual learning and performance of Korean percussion music. In some extraordinary cases, it has served as a gateway for even more rigorous explorations of traditional Korean music and transformational life experiences.
There are, of course, other factors that have contributed to the outward spread of samul nori to far-flung destinations. This book will consider some of those other factors, such as state support, circulation of recordings, the world music industry, and the development of musical notation. But it will invest more time reflecting on the dynamics of rhythmic form in relation to global samul nori. Born out of a collaborative musical experiment in the late 1970s, samul nori as a case study provides us with a special opportunity to witness the creation and development of a musical genre. Soon after its creation, the nascent samul nori genre began to be performed outside South Korea—first by way of international tours by the legendary SamulNori quartet, and then through imitation by amateur and semiprofessional percussion ensembles. Samul nori’s journey of globalization allows us to examine how rhythm-based forms can travel swiftly across boundaries. This rhythmic form, I posit, has been the key to its mobility. At first blush, framing this study in terms of musical form may seem unfashionable or even anachronistic. Why form, of all things? Let me explain.
MUSICAL GLOBALIZATION
Many important studies of global musics have shed light on the political, economic,
