Voices from Okinawa and Korea, Pt. 2

A musical counterpart to producer and curator Kazue Kobata's P.S.1 exhibition, "The Perpetual Moment: Visions from within Okinawa and Korea", with photographs depicting the effect of American military bases on their turf. The program features the musical traditions of the two peoples spiced with contemporary New Wave touches.



Playlist



Okinawa



01 "Sagi Chiju Ya (Prover)" - traditional Island song (Shima Uta) on sanshin, a banjo-like 3-string instrument, played by a master, Rinsho Kadekaru. An elegy.



02 "Rappa Bushi" - a kind of dialogical rap song by Rinsho Kadekaru and Haruko Higa. Comical entertainment.


03 "Kadi-ku" - another Island song featuring tongue-twisting onomatopoeia by master Shoei Kina on sanshin, and vocal.


04 "Tsukino Kaisha" ("Beautiful Moon") - vocal by a Deva, Misako Koja and her group, Nehnehz (Sisters). A romantic ballad.


05 "Shichigachi Eisah-Eisah for July" - a festive song with drum and bamboo castanet for dancing procession on the midsummer day of Buddhist ancestor worship. Lead vocal and sanshin by Sadao China.




Korea



06 "Kot Sang Yo: Portable Shrine with Flowers" - female solo by young master Kwon Soon Kang, with a drum and string orchestra in the Junga tradition. This is music for a funeral procession: the shrine contains a coffin.


07 "Frog Song"- by a New Wave male singer, Kim Yong Woo. "Kegol Kegol" is the sound of a frog, and the lyric goes with a
housewife sighing - in unison with the frog - while waiting for her husband and sons to come home for dinner.


08 "Samul-Nori" - drumming and singing and whirling dance (with long-tailed headgear) by four men. This traditional folk art
dates from medieval times. It was only in the late 1970's that young Kim Dok Soo and his group restored the art, and they
continue to marvel people in Korea and around the world.

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