November 30, 2009

Gaga for the gayagum

I have recently discovered the magic of the gayagum. The gayagum, if you missed it like I did in your Korean textbook along with Jindo dogs, the guy on the 5,000 won bill and some weird dance that I've since forgotten, is a kind of traditional Korean instrument, to use the words a Korean would.

I'm not ashamed it to admit that it really began with someone playing Wonder Girls songs on the gayageum, the best fusion of the impossibly old and garishly new since Metallica released S&M and Frederick Nietzche released this attack ad against Immanuel Kant.

At any rate, here's the video that got it all started:



Then I moved on to a version of Arirang, which is a kind of traditional Korean folk song:



This was followed by the Mission Impossible theme:



I ended with this clip, which shows the crazier sounds the gayagum can make:

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