Changdeokgung cultural event

This weekend I went to another cultural event through my school.  The director hears about a lot of these opportunities and promotes them to the foreign teachers.  I really wasn't feeling going to something that started at 9am on a Sunday, but my director caught me while I was developing a video-based course and I was caught off guard so I wasn't able to come up with a reason why I couldn't go.  A few of other teachers got roped into going too, so I wasn't the only one she managed to catch off-guard.

So, at 9am on a Sunday, I was at Changdeokgung Palace (창덕궁).

The event was three musical performances at different locations in the "secret garden" of the palace.  The palace itself was absolutely beautiful, but the secret garden was even better.  Admission to it costs extra, but I highly recommend it. (I got in for free because of the program, though~)

The first performance was near Buyongji Pond (부용지).  We listened to pansori (판소리), which I absolutely love. (If you're interested in listening to a short selection, here's a good one on youtube.)  The piece we listened to was an excerpt from the story of Chunhyang.  There's actually a movie made from the pansori piece, which you can watch with subtitles on youtube.  It includes parts of the song in the movie, which is really cool.

This is Buyongji pond. It's probably a lot prettier in summer when there are plants growing in it, but it was still really beautiful.
 

The pansori performance:

After that, there was a daegeum (대금) performance.  I tried to upload the video that I took, but it's too large for this blog. Here's a youtube video of the same piece by a different performer instead.

I've heard traditional music before, but the only instrument I knew by name was gayageum (가야금). I'd never heard a daegeum solo performance before, and it was really interesting.  I was expecting the clear sound you get out of a metal flute, but there were actually some harsher, buzzier tones as well. 
Once I got over my initial surprise at the change in tone quality, it was actually very beautiful to hear how each different kind of sound was used in the song.

The last performance was a court dance with a musical ensemble.

Surprisingly, the smallest flute was the loudest. Go figure.

After the performances and the tour were over, my coworkers, school director, and the woman from Korea Tourism Organization (the same one who ran the Namhansanseong trip) all went out to lunch in Insadong.  Definitely found a great restaurant to take people to when they come visit!

Overall, even though I had to get up really early in order to do this today and didn't really want to sign up in the first place, I had a great time.  I'm a bit sad that I'm not going to the next event, which is a walk-a-thon in November, but that's right around the time of the TOPIK exam and I'll probably want to do some extra studying.  There will be plenty of other events though~