A Modern Desire: Translating Musical Modernism and National Identity Formation in 1980s Korea

• In Event: Musical Crossings: Tradition and Rupture in Asian Identity Formation

Abstract

This paper examines exchanges between Korea and Europe in the sphere of Western art music in the 1980s. This study premises that in post-World War II Korea the notion of “catching up” was embedded so profoundly in many social dimensions during its process of recovery and development: four decades of colonization and subsequent near-deprivation of sovereignty by the U.S. and the Soviet upon manumission left Korea with heightened awareness of national identity in relation to the more developed, or Western, foreign. Such awareness was prevalent in the practice of Western music in Korea, creating a nebulous and multilayered notion of nationalistic music. The 1980s was a period of zealous “catching up” with the Western musical paradigms, as economic growth availed travel and study abroads to many, as compared to the 1950s through the 1970s, when the exposure to “new” Western music was a privilege entitled to a fortunate few. By examining specific cases of musical exchanges, including the Pan Music Festival, the main channel of introducing Western contemporary music in Korea since 1970, and the participation of Korean composers with the International Society for Contemporary Music, as well as cultural policy in Korea during the relevant time period, this paper attempts to highlight the involvement of Korean musicians in the European musical scene, their efforts to bring the latest European musical trends to the local musical movements, and ultimately, their underlying desire to emulate European modernism.

Author

• Jung-Min Lee, Duke University