Seoul Fringe Festival 2008

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"Heart of independent arts, Seoul Fringe Festival"
http://www.seoulfringe.net/

■ Seoul Fringe Festival is

○ Independent Arts Festival producing alternative arts and culture
The Seoul Fringe Festival is the independent arts festival which artists participate of own free will. It was stated from the Independent Arts Festival, commencing in 1998, that 'Revolution of Underground Culture' group of artists gathered to speak about how they could voice their own philosophies, philosophies different from that of the authoritative pure art and profit-oriented mass culture. Through activities of independent arts, the festival will generate alternative arts and culture and provide a place to exchange.

○ Power plant flowering colorful culture with open access scheme
The Seoul Fringe Festival is with independent artists from a variety of genres, theater, dance, mime, performance, music, visual arts and multi-media. It excludes an artistic jury system and opens an opportunity to encourage trial and experiment in different way. It brings new wind energy and makes rich soil in the arts.

○ The place to search for emerging artists as a frontier leading future
The Seoul Fringe Festival is a window to read the present and to predict the future through various ways which artists meet audience. The way is a challenge of jumping through regulatory hoops to use a space in different way and to extend a role of arts. It's the place to search for emerging artists who break down a border of genre and cross disciplines freely and show new works.

○ The festival to lift up our life through attraction and value of independent arts
The Seoul Fringe Festival would like to communicate to the present with different methods, creative exchanges of artists, encounter between arts and local community and dialogue with society. It keep moving and changing without a halt. To find out new works, it will be the festival to lift up our life with artists and audience who has challenging mind and behaviour.

 

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Watch this space for the event review, folks!

http://www.seoulfringefestival.net/english/index.asp

http://www.seoulfringefestival.net/admin/common/file_download.asp?filePath=etc&fileName=F-eng_guidebook.pdf

 

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Performing Arts

Ok, this Seoul Fringe Festival is for all performing arts...dance, music, mime, drama, etc all inclusive.

This is at the Hongdae district which is where the Hongik University is located. This is quite a happening, trendy area filled with the uni students. Lots of korean bbq eateries, cafes, bars, pubs, clubs. There are many live music clubs here and the bands play everynight. A good equal amount of rock and jazz live music. Loads of students carrying guitars, basses, etc walking around. Looks promising!

After spending tremendous effort (!) trying to locate the place of this festival, I finally found an information tent and 2 staff who can speak English (!!) to tell me that the gigs starts in the evening and where I can find them. I reach there in the day they weren't ready yet. Just a couple of nights ago, I saw on TV about Edinburgh Fringe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_Fringe) and I thought that there would be those performance artiste waiting to be discovered doing gigs on the street. But there weren't any.

Most of them are outdoor stages and free. Some of them are in the cafes/clubs which would impose a cover charge.

In the evening, I saw 3 acts:
1) CYCLE http://www.seoulfringefestival.net/...p?play_idx=390&program_cd=12&ymd_day=20080816

4 girls and a guy doing a dance cum drama thing.

Frankly, I don't understand what they are doing. And I believe I'm not the only one in the audience who feels this way.

2) This act, I dunno whats the name. Its got a keyboardist, a violinist, a dancer and a projectionist. They played a tune and the projectionist projected several images on the screen while the dancer danced in front of the screen. Errrmmmm...???

3) Lastly!! Its Swing Swing Swing!!!

 

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Club 2006 Space Blue + Kim Brothers + Mong

http://www.seoulfringefestival.net/fringedaily/fringedaily_view.asp?daily_idx=184
This is a jazz band which plays latin+swing+funk. Its a mixed up band with 2006 Space Blue and Kim Brothers and Mong. I don't know who's who. But they play my kinda music!

(The pianist is hidden by the trumpet and trombone players)

Its a 7+1 piece band. A regular drummer, a lady bongo+cowbell+all other percussion effects player, a double bassist, a vocalist, a trumpet, a trombone, a pianist and their special guest...an accordian player (!).

They were not bad. Pretty young people in their 20s. They can speak English!!! Woohoo!!! So happy. This cannot be taken for granted in Korea, you know.

Vocalist
The vocalist was superb! Her voice has depth. Her solo was cool...that kinda jazz ones where the vocals go...dum dum da di di la di dah dah doodle doo doo, etc. She's a fantastically nice person. She's learning to play the piano as well. I told her I'm a rookie and she says I can do it.

Pianist
The pianist is pretty good. And its a girl! Ms. Jeon Ji Yeon started learning the classical piano since she was 7 and a 5 years ago, at 23, she decided to pick up Jazz Piano after learning pop piano. Boy! She's groovy. She doesn't with this band usually, but a quartet at Club Palm every wednesday. So, she invited me to watch her play there. http://www.clubpalm.co.kr

She played a Casio stage piano which is not hers. She usually plays a regular Samick baby grand at Club Palm. It sounded thin but generally still ok.

Accordian player
Next, the accordian player!!!! Its a girl as well! And the accordian is very hot with her latin numbers playing with the band! Wooooshhh...this is a really interesting instrument. Similar to the keyboard and strings. The way it holds the chords gives the sound so much texture and depth. Its amazing to see how this instrument fitted in a jazz band setting. When this she's playing, the keyboardist didn't play.

I realised that I didn't catch her name. Shucks. Anyways, this lady majored in Jazz Piano but she switched camp after falling in love with Jazz Tango. No wonder she sounds so sexy on the accordian. Haha....it was really fun to listen to her solo. And she has been playing the accordian for 8 or 9 years already. She also invited me to her next gig, but I'm due to be back already. Such a pity!

I quite like this band. Easy listening stuff they play. Although they are not yet at the pro level (like those I saw in Switzerland, review posted in the other thread), but they are pretty promising. Maybe coz their pot bellies aren't showing yet. Hmmm....nowadays I'm incline towards judging musicians by the size of their pot bellies. I wonder why...heheh...They got the crowd moving, swinging and I believe at certain stage almost towards tango. They ended with a funk style 'Fly Me to the Moon' at the request of an audience. Awesome!

 

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Overall, its a nice platform for the waiting to be discovered artists to showcase their talent and for the Seoul people to have a chance to watch and appreciate the talented young ones amongst them.

Its on a much smaller scale than those fringe festivals in Western countries, but nevertheless its a good start.

Seoul has a jazz festival as well. 2nd year running this year. However, its in May. Nevermind, till next time.

 

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Pics added.