Gong Myoung Interview: SXSW 2010

Posted on Mar 11th 2010 3:00PM by Matthew Wilkening
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Since their spur-of-the-moment formation at a University performance 12 years ago, the four members of Korea's Gong Myoung have been dedicated to fusing modern sounds with traditional Korean music. They have served as talented and dedicated representatives of their nation's musical heritage with impressive performances at music and art festivals around the world. They even created their very own bamboo instrument, named, yes, the "Gong Myoung." You can hear it featured amongst their unique musical performances this March at SXSW. Spinner recently traded e-mails with the group across time zones and language barriers. They gamely answered our questions about their music, our modern pop culture, their pending visit to the States and what to do if your self-created instruments get lost at the airport:

Describe your sound in your own words:

Gong Myoung is focused on gathering the sound from the natural material, as is often the case with Korean traditional music.

How did your band form?

12 years ago, the four [of us] musicians that make up Gong Myoung played together for a performance in the University. At that time, [we] created music spontaneously.

What are your musical influences?

Korean traditional music is [our] priority. Meantime, [we are] interested in all kinds of sounds.

How did you come up with your band name?

Gong Myoung means "resonance"' in English. In other words, we want to share, deliver and communicate with people

What's your biggest vice?

Whenever we stand on the stage, we have to play the music automatically.

What's in your festival survival kit?

Korean instant noodles.

Who was your first celeb crush?

No one we can think of now.

What's your musical guilty pleasure?

The teenage girls group of Korea.

Beatles or Stones?

We can't choose one of them as we love both

What's the craziest thing you've seen or experienced while on tour?

We loved to see the people have passion about our music. And also, we've experienced that our music instruments did not arrive at the airport before, so we had to think how we could make our music instruments on the spot.

Matthew Wilkening is a contributor from Seed.com. Learn how you can contribute here.