Portfolio of compositions

Han, Kyungjin (2006) Portfolio of compositions. University of Southampton, Doctoral Thesis.

Record type: Thesis (Doctoral)

Abstract

One of the most significant times for me, in my development as a composer, was the period during my military service from 1996 to 98, experiences described in detail in chapter 2. This period made me speculate on two issues: the meaning of ‘difference’ and the ‘contrasts’ within human society, and more introspectively my ‘identity’ as a composer in both Korean and a more global culture.

My research is deeply connected to that period, and my compositions seek to illuminate the issues mentioned ‘musically’. I have attempted to express, sometimes speculatively, the first issue in the exploration of various compositional strategies – fragmentation, transformation, and re-juxtaposition of what are, essentially, ‘abstracted’ materials. Also, in consideration of the second issue I have come to actively accept and re-interpret the aesthetic values of traditional Korean music.

In the portfolio I would cite ‘Dae-jo’ for solo violin as the first work where some of these issues are concretised. In ‘Dancing on a bamboo’ for ensemble I have explored ‘nonghyun’ technique in the elaboration of dream images. ‘De Profundis’ for orchestra was influenced by theories of fractal geometry, particularly the ‘Cantor set’. ‘Jung-joong-dong’ for orchestra explores, heterophonically, imaginary links between the paintings of Joan Miró and the ancient East Asian philosophies of ‘yeobaek’ and ‘jung-joong-dong’. The cycle of three pieces are all derived from a reservoir of material drawn from ‘Chunhyangga’, one of the ‘pansori’ which constitute a unique musico-dramatic tradition from ancient Korea, most obviously in the opening of the first piece. Each piece in the cycle aims to create a different interface of specific traditional Korean materials with a more ‘generalised’ European ‘modernism’.

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