The Return of Spring

Over the pasts few years there has been a high-energy exchange taking place between Korean and Australian musicians which has produced a series of events firmly rooted in traditional Korean culture.

“One of the most powerful musical memories I have is listening to Bae Il Dong perform p’ansori on a waterfall at Chiri Mountain” –Simon Barker

The latest development sees Simon Barker and Scott Tinkler composing around the project, a work for a large section of the AAO.

The Return of Spring is the latest stage in a collaboration which began more than a decade ago and which was documented on Emma Franz’s film Intangilbe Asset Number 82.

In 2005 after an extraordinary journey throughout Korea with Kim Dong Won, Simon Barker created Daorum with Australian musicians Carl Dewhurst, Phil Slater and Matt McMahon and Korean traditional percussionist Kim Dong Won and p’ansori singer, Bae Il Dong.

Daorum was followed by Chiri which Simon developed with Scott Tinkler and Bae Il Dong. Chiri draws its name from the mountain where Il Dong spent a period of isolation training his voice by ‘singing against the waterfall’. It is a phenomenal meeting of old and new, East and West, which Living Arts Korea described as a “utopian anthem”.

‘If volcanoes could sing, then they would sound like Bae Il Dong. The Korean’s voice has such breadth that it not only fills physical space like a lava flow but seems to stretch back across time. —John Shand, Sydney Morning Herald

The collaborators draw on selections from the p’ansori classics as vehicles for improvisation which incorporate Korean traditional rhythms and contemporary jazz. The ensembles Daorum and Chiri have performed at international arts festivals including Hemispheres Festival Sydney Opera House (2008), Jeonju Sori Festival Korea (2006), Queensland Music Festival (2007), OzAsia Festival (2008), Gwangju World Music Festival Korea (2010) and the Lincoln Center for Performing Arts New York and the Smithsonian Institute Washington.