Korean Music

Korean music is broadly divided into 2 parts. South Korean and North Korean. The music that dwells in this country is mainly based on shamanistic beliefs and Buddhism.
The music that is traditional to Korea is mainly based on four type’s aristocrat, courtly, scholarly and religious. There is also the folk music that is loved by the locals and the rich alike. The music here is very complex but there is a continuous rhythm that is followed called the Jangdam.
Mostly all the folk songs are categorized under Dongbu Folk songs, but the vocal and music styles in it are varied, hence scholars are trying to further distinguish the songs to specific categories.
Songs from the province of Jeolla and Chungcheong are called Namdo folk songs. This style of songs got more recognition due to the pansori and sanjo musical genres created that won the hearts of many.  It even went international and has got a fan collection in India too. From the island of Jeju we have jeju folk songs that too earned some recognition.
We can further classify the music by knowing the style of the music, the instruments used and by the lyrics. For instance Pansori is where there is only one singer and one drummer. The lyrics include a story and jokes that are updated now and then. It is interactive as the audience too takes part in it.
Nongak is where there are around twenty or thirty performers. A smaller number of the Nongak was quite popular in the 70’s that enjoyed great success like the Samul Nori band. Sanjo music is purely instrumental and shifts rhythm and modes.
The Korean court music that was founded in 1392 is now very rarely found, except at the National Centre for Korean Traditional Performing Arts that is sponsored by the government organizations. Court music can be classified as Aak that had a strong influence from the Chinese. Then there is Hyang-ak that is completely Chinese and then there is a combination of the two that is called Dang-ak.
The instruments that are used in Korean music are vital to the sounds that are emanated. It is with these instruments that they stand apart from the music around the world.
The main one is the 12-string zither (gayageum) and geomungo, which is the 6 stringed version of the zither. There is also a 7 string and a 25-string zither. Next is the haegum, which is a 2 stringed vertical fiddle.
A large flute is called the daegum, piri is the cylindrical oboe, hojok or taepyongso is the conical oboe. The mouth organ is called the saenghwang, panpipes, flute with mouthpiece and hun is the globular flute. All these instruments are classified as the wind instruments.
The percussion instruments include small gong, large gong, sound drum, golk drum and folk hourglass drum. For the court music percussion also includes the bronze bells, stone chimes, tiger shaped wooden instrument and a square wooden box with a mallet.
One look at these instruments and you know they are out of the world so the music they create is bound to touch the soul.