Longing for Mt. Geumgang
(Composed by Choe Yeong-seob, Written by Han Sang-eok, , Performed by Mischa Maisky, Sung by The National Chorus of Korea)

Whose creation, you bright and beautiful Mountain?
Oh, how I miss twelve thousand peaks standing so high and silent.
Now I see our free people together humbled by You.
Thy longed for name of Mount Geumgang again near to us.
Thy beautiful shapes, left for a million years, but so long spoiled,
Today, we hearken to your beckoning call.

Whose mark already ahead on the Birobong peak before us?
Where indifferent white clouds and pine-scented breeze sweep,
Our homeland is still far away just below the mountain peak,
Till the day our deepest sorrow and agony melt away.
Thy beautiful shapes, left for a million years, but so long spoiled,
Today, we hearken to your beckoning call.

Translated by Lee Sang-do, Edited by Julian Hall

About the song

The song was originally composed by Choe Yeong-seob in 1961 and was first introduced on a radio program broadcast by the Korea Broadcasting System as "a song of the week", with its lyrics taken from a poem of the same title written by Han Sang-eok (1919-1989). The song was written during the national campaign to promote the beauty of nature on the Korean Peninsula in the early 1960s. Born in Incheon in 1919, Han graduated from Incheon Public Commercial High School in 1935 and wrote poems about various themes with his other fellow poet Kim Cha-hyeong at "Poems and Prose".

This song has been so popular among international musicians that world-famous?tenor Placido Domingo, Bolshoi Chorus from Russia, cello maestro Mischa Maisky and many other musicians have sung or recorded the song in 16 albums to delight audiences around the world for decades.

Choe was born in Incheon in 1929, graduated from Gyeongbok High School and Seoul National University's College of Music and taught at Ehwa Girls' High School and Hanyang University in Seoul. He later served as permanent conductor of Incheon Philharmonic Orchestra and president of the Korean Composers Association.