#pungmul

Aigoo, let’s do this one last time. My name is Mirae Jae. Friends call me MJ. My great great grandmother was bitten by a radioactive spider— and then nothing happened for a few generations. Until the day I woke up and found out I could punch through walls?? Nobody told me superpowers are genetic, but hey I’m figuring it out. For the past year, I’ve been the one and only: Spider Dancer. It’s been wild! I stopped some robberies, finally beat my Uncle Beom at baduk, and fought off this ugly green guy. I come from a long line of folk entertainers, so fighting crime isn’t really something that comes naturally. Sometimes I wonder why this inheritance chose me. But I have it now, so I might as well put it to good use right? And who says I can’t have some fun with it along the way? 

like holy shit

look at this shit

listen to this shit

Day 24 Dizzy: Pungmul dancer. The dangling streamer on their hats are such fun to watch. Always wondered if the dancers got dizzy keeping the streamer spinning.

I kind of feel like the IDOL performance at MMA did this really cool thing of framing BTS (and by extension, kpop as a whole) explicitly within the context of Korea’s cultural history of performance art?

Like the three drums dance, fan dancing, mask dancing, pungmul, and kpop, they’re all performance mediums that involve the integration of a lot of different elements. As Suga said: kpop isn’t really a genre of music, it’s the whole package of the music and the clothes and the makeup and the choreography. And that’s true of all of the traditional dances they pulled from in this intro.

Seeing kpop framed as not a new thing, but really as a continuation of this cultural heritage of performance art is really cool.

Pungmulori Dancers, Damyang, South Korea, January 1, 2018 

Nongak - meaning “farmers' music” is a Korean folk music tradition that includes drumming, dancing, and singing. Most performances are outside, with dozens of players, all in constant motion. Pungmul is rooted in the dure (collective labor) farming culture. It was originally played as part of farm work, on rural holidays, at other village community-building events, and to accompany shamanistic rituals, mask dance dramas, and other types of performance. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pungmul)

Wheel of Joy (피보나치 삼태극 / Fibonacci Samtaegeuk)

Read more at The Korea Herald

— by Im Eun-byel: Since the age of 5, percussion master Kim Duk-soo has dedicated his life to Korea’s traditional performing arts. Now, more than 60 years later, his dedication is as strong as ever…

Image courtesy of The Korea Herald/Park Hyun-koo