First launched in 2015, Hello K! is Korea’s national brand performance that has established itself as a cultural performance for foreigners in Korea from all levels of society in all corners of the world. Hello K! is a fusion, experience-based performance that combines Korean culture and art that encompasses tradition and modernity with cutting-edge audio-visual technology. In 2020, we present to the world Hello K! Renewed, or Hello K! A New Normal with a wish that the beauty of Korean culture and art will bring consolation and peace to everyone in the global community affected by the COVID-19.

The Sounds of Nature, Humans and Time

Imagine this place
Going back hundreds of years in time
A concert is being held
Not in a banquet hall for the show of power
But in a frugal space in an old structure

Listen to the sounds
Coming from the concert being held in an old temple
The sound of silence, the sound of the calm
And the sound of time - reflecting and cultivating

Be one with nature
Making no loud sound, no large structures
And no surprises to the greens and the birds
The voices of humans and the instruments harmonize with nature

Pansori is the Korean opera in which one performer plays all the characters. There are always a dramatic story and interesting characters. Pansori sings about a legend, a heroic story, and a satire of the lives of the commoners and the nobles.

For scholars, or men of virtue, in the old days, music meant a cultivation of mind rather than entertainment. Music, ultimately, was a tool they utilized to find peace with nature and to be free from oneself.

In short, Korean traditional music performed by the scholars resembled their purpose in life. Playing the instrument, singing, and dancing were part of academic curricula. They danced and sang in an artistic way, about the emptiness of ambition, the limitedness of life, and the respect for the nature.

In Korean traditional music, each note has meaning - earth, fire, water, tree, and metal from the doctrine of the five natural elements of the positive and negative. A musical piece is created by folding, vibrating, pressing, and twisting a note to change the depth and texture of tone color.

It took hundreds of years to build certain historic structures. Like such old historic buildings, it took very long time for Korean traditional music to take the current form.

Experience the aesthetics of slowness.

Player
Pansori: SungHee Choi

Credits
Producer/Executive Director: Jinyoung Park
Technical Director: Sangkyu Lee
Assistant Director: Bumsoo Shin
Director of Photography: Jongmin Kim, Jujin Son, Youngduk Lee
Camera Operator: Content Korea
VR Camera Director: Content Korea
VFX: Content Korea
Editor: Sangkyu Lee, Bumsoo Shin
Photographer: Sungchul Roh
Artists Management: Fantasmakorea
Music Director: Jinyoung Park, Sungwoo Kang, Donghyun Lim
Recording Engineer: Hyungkuk Ahn
Makeup Artist: Dajung Kim
Gaffer: Creative Arts

Connect with HELLO K!:
https://hellok.kr/
https://www.facebook.com/2020hellok
https://www.flickr.com/photos/hellomrk
https://www.youtube.com/c/hellok