South Korea is known for many things: electronics, automobiles and education, to name a few. Less well known is its long tradition of choral music; this small Asian country supports professional choirs in all of its major cities as well as a variety of community, school and church choirs.
Michael Porter, assistant professor and director of choral music at Boise State University, recently traveled to South Korea to work with and observe several of these groups. He was part of a seven-person delegation selected by the American Choral Directors Association to spend 10 days as guests in South Korea. While there, he worked with both children’s and professional choirs in the cities of Seoul and Cheongju.
Participants were chosen through a peer-reviewed audition and application process and were paired with conductors in South Korea as part of the International Conductors Exchange Program.
“Each year the program focuses on a different country, chosen for its strong choral traditions,” Porter said. “In South Korea, choral music is part of their national identity. I was excited to learn how robust South Korea’s music education system is.”
After first attending the association’s conference in Seoul, Porter spent seven days in Cheongju, about three hours to the south. There he worked with the city choir of Cheongju and with conductor Kee Tae Kong.
Porter introduced choir members to American choral traditions – particularly African American spirituals and folk songs. He then returned to Seoul, where he was able to work with Presbyterian and Baptist church choirs, as well as high school, children’s and community choirs.
Porter found that before he could teach them the music and lyrics of some of the standard African American spirituals, he first had to teach them the history of American slavery and how music came out of that system. He also spent time instructing them on the dialect of the South.
“In Korean, the vowel sounds are very pure,” he said. “They don’t have some sounds, like the ‘uh’ in gospel or singin’.”
Michael Porter, center, with South Korean choral colleagues.
This instruction in language intrigued his students, who wanted to know why he spent so much time on it. “It’s a gateway to the culture of a community,” he told them.
Long before heading to Asia, Porter had explored the music of other countries and cultures and has encouraged his students to experience music outside their own communities. Whether its learning a song from another country or foreign travel, the experience can be life changing.
“I want students to understand that they are not just U.S. citizens, but that they are global citizens,” he said.
Music is perfect for that, he said, because it opens minds to different ways of examining our place within the discipline.
Choral music also has the added advantage of putting the singer within a context greater than himself or herself. “You’re in a situation where you can’t do it on your own. You have to rely on the success of the person next to you,” he said. “It’s a selfless activity. Less of I and more of we.”
He’ll use what he learned abroad this coming year when the Boise State Meistersingers perform some of the selections he was exposed to in South Korea. He also was able to connect with educators and conductors in South Korea, including one who is putting together an American tour and hopes to visit Boise State at some time in the near future.
BY: KATHLEEN TUCK PUBLISHED 2:35 PM / AUGUST 11, 2016