Interview: Dr. Kwon Gil-Sang

Click here for Full Issue of Fidelio Volume 5, Number 2, Summer 1996 To this day, this is I N T E RV I E W / Dr. Kwon Gil-sang a common experience for children in Korea. Korea has an unusually high percentage of Christians, for an Asian nation, and many children come to love Western classical music very early, by singing in church every week. ‘We had to find When I entered first grade, my teacher Mr. Yun a way to uplift was, by chance, also very musical. I was so inspired when I the children’ heard him singing, that I wanted to be like him. Fidelio: The DR.KWON GIL-SANG, the leading Fidelio: Dr. Kwon, how did you African-American baritone Robert composer of Korean children’s songs, is become interested in music as a McFerrin tells the story, of how he the son of a Christian minister. He was child? heard Marian Anderson singing born in Seoul in 1927, during the Dr. Kwon: Like so many other German lieder as a boy. “I had no Japanese Occupation. He was a co- Korean musicians, I grew up in a idea what she was saying,” he told founder of the Korean Bong Sun Hwa parish house, for my father was a me, “but I knew that was it.” Children’s Choir in 1945, and Presbyterian minister. Dr. Kwon: Yes, I had exactly that graduated from Seoul National We had most of our music from experience. We had music hour University School of Music in 1948. In the Western missionaries. As a every day in that first grade class. 1953, at the end of the Korean War, he child, every day in church I heard composed the children’s song “At the the foot-pedal pipe organ (we had Fidelio: What kind of songs did you Flower Garden (Kkot bat tai seo),” no power organs). We had our sing? the unofficial national anthem of the church hymnals, with Christian Dr. Kwon: Children’s songs, and Korean-American community. hymns, and some Bach, and a bit of many simple Western songs, such as In 1964, Maestro Kwon emigrated other classical music. From the age “Heidenröslein” by Schubert. This to the United States, where he of five, I was playing and singing was in the 1930’s, during the Japan- continues to found children’s choirs “Jesus Loves Me,” “Rock of Ages,” ese Occupation [Japanese troops throughout Southern California, and and so on. I played and sang entered Korea in 1895, and formally to publish his songs. In August 1995, through the entire hymnal book occupied it from 1910 to August, he was honored as one of Korea’s when I was very young. Mrs. Oh 1945–Ed.]. German lieder were very national treasures by the South Shin, Jai-dock, the church organist, popular in Japan, and also in Korea. Korean government at the was a professor at Ewha Women’s We also sang some Japanese chil- Celebration of Korea’s 50th College [Korea’s most prestigious dren’s songs, such as “Haru ga kita Anniversary of Liberation in Seoul. women’s school–Ed.]. (Spring has come).” Many Japanese Maestro Kwon was interviewed by Of course, we also have our children’s songs also, actually, come Kathy Wolfe, at his home in Los ancient Korean folk songs, but they from the Western missionaries in Angeles on July 13, 1995. mix very well with Western music. Japan; in Japan, for example, all stu- 76 © 1996 Schiller Institute, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission strictly prohibited. dents sing a song with the melody of Music—at that time it was called You must realize, this was right after “Auld Lang Syne” when they gradu- Seoul Music School—to get a music the war, in 1945; conditions in Seoul ate from high school. education degree. were bad. Food and fuel and cloth- Of course, the terrible part of this When I arrived, Dr. Hyun Jae- ing were scarce. We had to find some was, that during the Japanese Occu- myung, or Rody Hyun as he’s also way to uplift the children. pation, the official language of Korea known, was the head of the School. Once I had this children’s choir, was Japanese, and never Korean. Dr. Hyun was a prominent composer however, they needed new songs! So Newspapers were in Japanese; we of Korean Lyric Songs. He was born I had to learn to compose. spoke Japanese in school. So, we in 1902, and in the 1920’s, he came to That same year, after the Japanese could not sing Korean songs in the University of Chicago, and a year withdrew from Korea in August of school, because the Japanese feared it later moved to the Gunn School of 1945, the Seoul office of Japan state would be too patriotic. Even today, Music. It was in Chicago that he radio, Nihon Hoso Kyoku or NHK after many years in the United composed the well-known song as it’s known in Tokyo today, sud- States, as with so many Koreans of “Thoughts of My Homeland denly became the Korean Broadcast- my generation, I find it easier to (Kohyang Saeng-gak)”; he composed ing System. Of course Korea never speak Japanese than English, since I learned it so fluently as a child. I was studying Music Education, and I founded a children’s Fidelio: In Los Angeles, many beau- chorus. This was right after the war, in 1945; conditions in tiful Korean Lyric Songs are per- Seoul were bad: food, and fuel, and clothing were scarce. formed, which sound as though they were composed by some friend of Once I had this children’s choir, however, they needed Brahms in the 1870’s. I was surprised to learn that many were actually new songs! So I had to learn to compose. composed during the 1920’s and 1930’s—in part, as a patriotic response to the Japanese Occupation both the poem and the music, about had its own radio network before; of Korea. 1928. since the invention of radio, we had Dr. Kwon: Yes, the composers put Another teacher of mine was a been occupied by Japan. We didn’t into music, what we could not say in composer at Seoul Music School, have a country, much less a radio words. It was always very poetic, it Kim Sung-tae, who studied Western station. could never be specific; to speak music in Japan during the pre-World Now, for the first time, we had a openly of the nation was not allowed. War II period. national radio network—and for the Sometimes, they seem to be only sim- Kim Dong-jin, the composer of first time, we could broadcast in our ple love songs, a boy’s love for his “Azaleas (Chindallae-ggot),” was own language! That’s how KBS was sweetheart. But the people knew also composing at that time. He was founded—and our children’s group what the poems meant. also a minister’s son, who studied in went every day, to the radio station, Seoul with the Christian missionaries to sing on the radio for the people. Fidelio: When did you decide to there, and began studying music For the first time, we could sing become a composer? education, and then started to com- Korean songs publicly. That was the Dr. Kwon: Actually, I decided to be pose. He’s over eighty now; he’s been founding of the KBS Seoul Chil- a music teacher; composing only composing since the 1930’s. dren’s Choir. came out of that, much later. My Times were bad during 1945-50; father wanted me to become an engi- Fidelio: There was a lot of composi- but we felt that, at last, now it’s our neer. But I was so inspired by my tion going on at the school when you country; now we need our own teacher, Mr. Yun, that I decided that enrolled? songs. The composers began to write I really wanted to teach music—to be Dr. Kwon: Yes; and so there I was, more and more. My first composi- able to give that same joy, which my studying Music Education, with tions were written then, during 1946- teacher gave to me, to others, espe- Dr. Hyun and Kim Sung-tae. At that 47. In 1945, U.S. troops were in the cially to young children. So, when I time, I founded a children’s chorus in south, and Soviet troops in the north, was eighteen, in 1945, I enrolled in the neighborhood of the school, to but we did not think they would Seoul National University School of bring more children into the church. divide the nation. 77 Then came 1950, and the Korean around everywhere, singing for the for her, and she was only in her War—and Seoul was destroyed. troops. twenties, but she began singing right Everything was devastated during the away. “Everyone knows that song,” [North Korean] invasion, millions of Fidelio: And you wrote your most she said. “Whoever doesn’t know people were killed, buildings were famous song, “At the Flower Garden that song, must be a spy!” flattened, it was far worse than World (Kkot bat tai seo),” around that time? Dr. Kwon: Yes, and the children had War II. In 1950, when war came, I Dr. Kwon: Yes, after the war, we a good time, too. Many of them went was teaching music in high school. I returned to Seoul, and I went back to on to become fine musicians.

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