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| Seoul Donhwamun Traditional Theater |
By Kim Se-jeong
The COVID-19 pandemic has hit musicians particularly hard ― they have lost opportunities to perform and many have been forced to take temporary jobs to support themselves.
While the central government is providing some financial assistance, the Seoul Donhwamun Traditional Theater, a facility dedicated to the promotion of traditional Korean music run by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, is looking to provide performance opportunities for the artists.
In April, the theater launched LINK, a concert series, to give local traditional music groups and singers a chance to perform. The performances are streamed live on sdtt.or.kr as well as YouTube and Naver TV.
LINK's next session will feature traditional singer Lee Bong-geun, Wednesday, while Friday's session features the Baramgot Strings trio.
In addition, together with the Korean Cultural Center in Washington, D.C, the theater began the "Gugak Remix Series" earlier this month ― gukak means traditional Korean music. The next session will feature the Go Back Project, June 25. The performance will also be streamed live on YouTube and the Korean Culture Center's Facebook and Instagram pages.
Choi Min-ho, general manager of Donhwamun, said the theater was an early mover in online streaming.
"We started online streaming in February. We were an early mover in providing the service and drew the attention of the music industry for this," Choi said. "We had a feeling the pandemic would last for some time and we responded fast."
The LINK project was the theater's initiative to deal with the pandemic and is drawing positive responses from viewers.
"Our YouTube likes jumped more than tenfold since we started the streaming service," Cho said.
The theater pays all performing artists for their performance, but as this was deemed insufficient it also collected donations from viewers.
"Now, you can see a donation button on the YouTube and Naver TV pages. We collaborate with the Arts Council Korea (ARKO), encouraging viewers to make a donation which will be used to help the artists cope with the pandemic," Cho said.
The theater's move parallels that of the city government which has been giving financial support to local musicians with online projects.
The next question for the theater is to find ways to generate profits from the online service.
"We're born to promote traditional music. What we want to do is build a profit-making mechanism and share it with local artists to help them," Cho said.
Located across from Changdeok Palace in Seoul, the theater opened in 2016 with a 140-seat main theater exclusively for traditional Korean music. Donhwamun refers to the main gate of Changdeok Palace. Visit sdtt.or.kr for more information about LINK and other performances.
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| The main hall of Seoul Donhwamun Traditional Theater / Courtesy of Seoul Donhwamun Traditional Theater |
