By GaYoung Kim
Translated SeungYeon Woo



The ‘Korean Night’ concert, held in Café 939 on the 15th, was successful from start to finish. It was starting from janggu and kkwanggwari performance and ended with the ensemble of ‘Beautiful Land’ sung by a famous Korean singer Sunhee Lee.

The concert was hosted by the group, ‘Popcorn,’ which was organized by Korean students at Berklee College of Music in order to support their music business ventures, and it was quite an overwhelming concert.

The President of ‘Popcorn’, Ki-ho Kwon, explained, “‘Popcorn’ is not just one of the typical student groups. Rather, it was organized to support Korean students who are stressed out about the future of music business-related things like publicity, production, media and performance. Although they have outstanding talents, Korean students are falling behind because of lack of networks and ability to communicate” in the music field; this led us to plan the concert to enhance the students’ position.”

Considering the fact that there are about 400 students at Berklee, they could have started to set up the annual Korean concert already. Berklee College of Music President, Roger Brown, who is familiar with the influence of Korean students at Berklee and rapidly increasing popularity of K-Pop, showed his affection for K-Pop duting his visit to Korea last year. “My son is a big fan of Girl’s Generation (So Nyuh Shi Dae) and he envied me when I told him that I was visiting Korea to meet alumni,” said President Brown.

The first performance was Pungmulnori by ‘Oori’, the MIT Samulnori group, which has now become well known though a variety of events related to Korean traditions. Afterwards, the concert continued with the most active vocalist in Berklee, Min-ji Kil’s ‘I’m in Love’, Sung-Heo’s ‘As Your First Feeling’ and their duet song, ‘Nagging’.

Followed by the duet song, Hey-rim Jeon was the next performer. Jeon is a jazz pianist who was appointed to become the first Korean professor in the Piano Department at Berklee. She said, “I came to Berklee when I was 18. Since then, I have put enormous effort for 10 years into becoming a professor. Now, I achieved my goal but I still feel like I’m living in a dream.” On the stage, she played a fusion-jazz style arrangement of a Korean children’s song, ‘Hey Fox, Hey Fox’ and she also played ‘Hip-Gnosis’ by Oori on piano.

During the second half of the concert, Seo Mun Tak took the stage. While she was singing her ‘billion seller’ hit songs, the audience stood up as if they were at Seo’s standing concert. Although Seo has been famously known for some time now not only in Korea but also at Berklee, she did not spare herself at all; rather, she mingled with the audience and brightened up the mood of the entire concert.

She sincerely showed what ‘professionalism’ is. Also, it was a great time for the audience to be indulged in reminiscence by singing Seo’s hit songs together, starting from, ‘Love, That Never Fades Away’ to ‘Chain’ and ‘Sa Mi In Gok’.

The consul general in Boston, Kang-ho Park, at the concert said, “I’m glad to spend my night with a great deal of enjoyment.” Professor Jeon said, “I’m very proud and grateful that there are so many musically talented Korean students at Berklee.”

[email protected]

ⓒ 보스톤코리아(http://www.bostonkorea.com), 무단전재 및 재배포 금지