Pianist Park Chang-soo to hold relay concert with 24 artists

Pianist Park Chang-soo, who is known for “The House Concerts,” will hold another relay performance with 24 musicians and artists following its success last year. The concert will be held non-stop at Yul Haus in southern Seoul, starting from 5 p.m. next Friday to 4 p.m. the following day. The title of the performance is the same as that of last year, “Why should? Why shouldn’t?”, only with a label “Season 2.”

“When I first told my plan to a friend who’s a philosopher, he said ‘why should you do that?’. When I asked another friend who also majored in philosophy, he said ‘why shouldn’t you do that?’, so I thought this could make a good title,” the pianist explained how he named the performance.

Park said that he does not want people to view the upcoming performance just as an unconventional attempt. “I wanted to let people know that we have contents to show the performance of 24 musicians in various genres within a day,” he said.

This year’s edition will feature a variety of musicians including haegeum player Kang Eun-il, daegeum player Cha Seung-min, violinist Lee Kyung-sun, harpist Lee Ki-hwa, electronic musician Choi Kang-hee, and Cha Hye-ri, who plays with a toy piano. Japanese butoh dancers will also appear on the stage. There are no rules. Park’s “free” music will start when the stage lights up.

Park has held “The House Concerts” since 2002 when he first started the living room concert at his home in Yeonhui-dong, Seoul. He hosted a nationwide “One Day Festival” in 2013, and some 100 concerts were held within a day in Korea, China, and Japan in 2014. This developed into a “One Month Festival” in the following year, in which over 400 concerts took place in a month in 27 countries. Park said the dedication of three managers including Kang Sun-ae at Kumho Asiana Cultural Foundation has made a huge contribution to the concerts’ success.


gustav@donga.com