Category: Performing Arts

Join us for an enchanted evening of Korean traditional dance performances. Kim Myoseon, Master Instructor of Seungmu (monk’s dance), the 27th Important Intangible Cultural Property of the Republic of Korea, and her company present a series of dance performances and provide a fascinating account behind the formation and evolution of Korean dance.

 

 

An Evening of Korean Traditional Dance

Tuesday, January 23, 2024 | 6:30 PM (EST)

 

The Korea Society
350 Madison Avenue, 24th Floor
New York, NY 10017

 

 

 

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About the Speaker:

Renowned dancer Kim Myoseon was designated as Master Instructor of Seungmu, the 27th Important Intangible Cultural Property of Korea, in 2005. She is Chief Artistic Director of Balim Dance Company and Chair of the Ubong Imaebang Dance Preservation Association, which was founded to preserve the legacy of her late teacher Lee Mae-bang. Kim also served as an exchange professor at University of California, Los Angeles, and has established 13 Kim Myoseon National Intangible Cultural Heritage Seungmu Training Centers globally, located in Los Angeles, Houston, Washington, New Jersey, Tokushima, Yokohama, Osaka, Nagoya, Okayama, Incheon, Busan, Mokpo, and Seoul. Among many honors and awards she has received are the 2021 Korea Arts and Culture Achievement Award and was the Grand Prize at 33rd Korean Traditional Music Awards.

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Photo (c) Lee Jong Sam

ADG7 is back–this time in person!

The nine-piece South Korean ensemble ADG7 (aka Ak Dan Gwang Chil) draws equal inspiration from newly reclaimed Korean folk styles of gut and minyo and the contemporary stylings of modern K-Pop for a mix that will surprise you with its raucous, danceable energy. The band’s charismatic three frontwomen are backed by masterfully played traditional Korean instrumentation and present a distinctively theatrical style of performance that’s like nothing you’ve ever heard before, but that you’ll never forget. You won’t want to miss the crowd-pleasing sonic sensations that The New York Times calls “catchy, bouncy and brash.”

The Korea Society is proud to support ADG7’s concert in New York at Le Poisson Rouge, presented by World Music Institute. WMI’s COUNTERPOINT series focuses on contemporary artists who push the boundaries of what “world music” can mean in the 21st Century.

 

ADG7 (AK DAN GWANG CHIL)

Wednesday, May 3, 2023 | 8 PM

PURCHASE TICKETSPURCHASE TICKETS @ Le Poisson Rouge 158 Bleecker St, Manhattan

 

Doors: 7 PM | Show: 8 PM
Le Poisson Rouge
158 Bleecker St, Manhattan
Tickets: Advance $30 | Day of Show $35
Standing Room with Limited Seating

 

 

 

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The Korea Society is thrilled to sponsor The Dive: The Songs of Julia Riew featuring Julia Riew, Claire Kwon, Natalie Choo and others at 54 Below, Broadway’s supper club.

Fred Ebb Award Winner Julia Riew returns to 54 Below and makes her New York City solo concert debut. The evening will feature original music from a variety of projects including Julia’s viral musical Dive (previously known as Shimcheong: A Folktale), a fantasy-novel-inspired song cycle, and some of her other greatest online-and-onstage hits. Stepping into the solo spotlight for the first time, the composer-lyricist will be joined by rising theater stars to perform in a joyous celebration of lyric, melody, and the diversity across our experiences.

The concert will feature performers Claire Kwon (Always Famous), Emily Borromeo (The Prom Nat’l Tour, School of Rock), Juliet Lee, Kevin Perdido (Always Famous), Marina Kondo (KPOP, Frozen Nat’l Tour), and Natalie Choo. The band will be led by music director Simon Broucke, and will feature Noah Weisbart on guitar, Shelby Blezinger-McCay on Drums, Skyler Volpe on Bass, and Jeremiah Blacklow on violin.

 

THE DIVE: THE SONGS OF JULIA RIEW

Thursday, April 27, 2023 | 7 PM

PURCHASE TICKETS @ 54 Below 254 W 54TH ST. CELLAR, NYC 10019

 

Use code RIEW5 for $5 off of Main Dining Room or Bar Rail cover charge;

Cover charge starts at $35, plus a $25 food/beverage minimum.

 

 

 

 

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About the Performer:

Julia Riew is a Korean-American composer, lyricist, librettist, and writer from St. Louis and currently based in New York City. She is primarily known for her musical Dive (previously known as Shimcheong: A Folktale), which amassed over 100k followers online and over 16 million streams on an animated music video of its titular song in Korea. Julia graduated from Harvard University in May 2022 and is First-Year in the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop. In her first year out of college, she has been named the 2022 Fred Ebb Award winner, Playbill’s Featured Songwriter of the Month, A Woman to Watch on Broadway, and the recipient of the 2022 Harvardwood Artist Launch Fellowship under the mentorship of composer Laurence O’Keefe (Legally Blonde, Heathers). Julia was the inaugural recipient of the Musicians United for Social Equity (MUSE) Linda Twine Scholarship (2021), a member of the first MUSE One-on-One Mentorship Program (2021-22) (mentor: Jeanine Tesori), and a member of the inaugural Maestra Music Mentorship Program (2020-21) (mentor: Deborah Wicks La Puma). Her past works include Alice’s Wonderland, an original musical co-written by J Quinton Johnson (Hamilton), Jack and the Beanstalk: A Musical Adventure (The American Repertory Theater’s 2020 Family Musical), and Thumbelina: A Little Musical (The A.R.T. 2019 Family Musical).

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Robert Browning Associates, Lotus Music & Dance, and Roulette present in association with The Korea Society and the Korean Cultural Center New York: gamin & ensemble: Korean Music & Beyond

This entrancing program of traditional Korean music (rooted in shamanic rituals and agrarian life) and contemporary music influenced by Korean culture is led by the engaging master multi-instrumentalist gamin (piri -double-reed oboe, saenghwang – mouth organ, and taepyungso – double-reed horn). Her extensive credits include being a principal player at the National Gugak Orchestra for a decade, performing in the Silk Road concert with Yo-Yo Ma in Seoul, and touring the world. The program features improvised music for rituals, percussive farmer’s music, and modern works. gamin will be joined by Satoshi Takeishi (percussion), Vong Pak (janggo – drum), Jeff Fairbanks (piano, trombone), Choi Fairbanks (cello), Marty Ehrlich (bass clarinet, saxophone), and other artists to be announced.

This event is co-presented by Robert Browning Associates, Lotus Music & Dance, and Roulette, in association with The Korea Society and the Korean Cultural Center New York.

 

Robert Browning Associates, Lotus Music & Dance, and Roulette present in association with The Korea Society and the Korean Cultural Center New York:

 gamin & ensemble: Korean Music & Beyond

Friday, March 31, 2023 | 8 PM

PURCHASE TICKETS Roulette Intermedium 509 Atlantic Avenue | Brooklyn, NY 11217

 

 

 

 

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About gamin:

gamin is a Korean born NYC based multi-instrumentalist specialized for traditional Korean wind. She tours the world performing both traditional Korean music and cross-disciplinary collaborations. She is a scholar and designated Yisuja, official holder of Korea’s Important Intangible Cultural Asset No. 46. From 2000 to 2010, gamin was the principal player at the National Gugak Orchestra. gamin has received several cultural exchange program grants, including Artist-in-Residence at the Asian Cultural Council, and has collaborated in cross-cultural improvisation with world-acclaimed musicians, presenting premieres at Roulette Theater, New School, and Metropolitan Museum. gamin was featured artist at the Silkroad concert, Seoul, 2018, performing on-stage with the founder, Yo-Yo Ma. Since 2018, gamin curated performances at the Center for Remembering and Sharing. For 2020, gamin was selected as artist-in-residency at the HERE Arts Center, NYC, and her album ‘Nong’ was released by Innova Records. gamin’s Carnegie Hall solo début, accompanied by Nangye Gugak Orchestra, scheduled for March 2020, was postponed by Covid 19. For 2021-2022, gamin was awarded the prestigious two year Fellowship by Jerome Hill Foundation.

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“[Han] is not an easy word to understand. It has generally been understood as a sort of resentment. But I think it means both sadness and hope at the same time. You can think of Han as the core of life, the pathway leading from birth to death. . .” Park Kyongni (1994)

An ancient dance is performed under a neon light. A virgin ghost stares out of the TV. A baby left alone in an apartment meditates on the nature of solitude. A woman explores memories of her life in relation to the Korean concept of Han.

Our heroine moves back and forth between the ancient myths of “Gojoseon,” the era of her dead grandmother, her mother’s past and her own life. Three generations of Korean women bound together in the “resilient silence” of Han. How will she navigate the sea of expectations that life, family, and nation have thrown her way? Through her struggle to understand the complexity of her own Han, which ignites a fire in her mind, we are carried into a dynamic meditation that explores the no man’s land that exists between myth and modernity, as we weigh the relation between suffering, sacrifice, and destiny.

HAN! is directed by Thomas Richards, theater director and former Artistic Director of the Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards in Pontedera, Italy. There, he began as the protégé and then essential collaborator of famed Polish director and performing arts theorist Jerzy Grotowski, considered to have been one of the greatest reformers of 20th century theater and one of the founders of experimental theater.

Directed by Thomas Richards; Assistant Directors: Cécile Richards Jessica Losilla-Hébrail.

The show is in Korean with English subtitles performed by Hyun Ju Baek.

Thursday February 9, 2023 | 7 PM

JERSEY CITY THEATER CENTER White Eagle Hall 337 Newark Ave, Jersey City, NJ 07302

 

 

 

February 23 – March 12, 2023

LA MAMA EXPERIMENTAL THEATER 66 E. 4th Street, New York, NY 10003

 

 

 

 

             

 

The Korea Society
350 Madison Avenue, 24th Floor
New York, NY 10017

 

 

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About the Performer:

Hyun Ju Baek was born in South Korea. Her career developed mainly as a musical theatre actress for a decade in Korea. She traveled to London to study theatre directing and earned a master’s degree in Theatre and Performance at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK. Before joining the Workcenter Hyun Ju worked as an actress, director, and playwright in both Seoul and London. She wrote, produced and directed many theatre pieces including: Flatmates V Zombies (Tristan Bates Theatre UK, Camden People’s Theatre UK – a piece that won a fund of the Arts Council of England); The lady of Burma (Moon Light Theatre Korea); Today and (commissioned by Kyunggi Cultural Foundation); The Sound Factory (commissioned by the Pusan Cultural Foundation). In 2017, she participated in the Workcenter’s Master Course, supported by the Korean Arts Council. After attending another pedagogic encounter with Thomas Richards in Hongkong, she organized a theatre group: The association for Theatre Craft and Creative Process GB, and held the Seoul Work Encounter 2018, inviting to Korea the Focused Research Team in Art as Vehicle. The following year, she joined the Workcenter’s Focused Research Team in Art as Vehicle.

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During the silent film era in Korea, movie screenings were accompanied by live music and narrators called Byeonsa. This special screening of Crossroads of Youth invites you to encounter the film just as Korean audiences did in 1934. The Korean Film Archive and director Kim Tae-yong have reimagined the traditional Byeonsa theatrical event, bringing together the film, live musicians, actors, and narration for a dynamic multimedia experience.

Thursday November 3, 2022 | 7 PM

Gerald W Lynch Theater
524 W 59th St, New York, NY 10019

Saturday November 5, 2022 | 7 PM

University of Pittsburgh
Alumni Hall, 7th Floor

 

 

The Korea Society
350 Madison Avenue, 24th Floor
New York, NY 10017

 

 

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The Crossroads of Youth Byeonsa Performance US Tour will begin this November, bringing a byeonsa troupe from South Korea to the United States for a multi-city tour.

 

The Crossroads of Youth Byeonsa Performance US Tour will begin this November, bringing a byeonsa troupe from South Korea to the United States for a multi-city tour. The byeonsa troupe will present Crossroads of Youth – directed by Ahn Jong-hwa and released in 1934, Korea’s oldest surviving silent film. A screening of this film is presented with live storytelling, music, and acting in accompaniment. Reimagining and reconstructing the byeonsa culture, Korea’s unique film watching tradition from the Japanese occupation period, this event provides a full theater experience unlike any other.

This unique project was spearheaded by director Kim Tae-yong. A film director and screenwriter, Kim’s films include Memento Mori, Family Ties, and Late Autumn.

In this conversation, Kim discusses discovering and restoring the only surviving Korean silent film and the journey of bringing the old form of entertainment to contemporary audiences.

 

A Conversation with Kim Tae-yong

Wednesday, November 2, 2022 | 5 PM (EDT)

 

 

The Korea Society
350 Madison Avenue, 24th Floor
New York, NY 10017

 

 

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About the Speaker:

Kim Tae-yong is a South Korean film director and screenwriter. After his feature directorial debut Memento Mori (1999), he helmed the critically acclaimed Family Ties (2006), and the English-language remake Late Autumn (2010).

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