By Margareth Theresia
Photos = Kim Sunjoo
Video = Lee Jun Young

Twenty foreign nationals on Nov. 7 from 1 p.m. visited the practice room of Seoul Namsan Gukakdang in Seoul's Jung-gu District. Their passion for learning pansori (traditional lyrical opera) was stronger than the cold weather.

A renowned pansori master headed a workshop for foreign participants as part of the inaugural World Pansori Festival. Min Hye Sung, National Intangible Cultural Heritage No. 5 and a disciple of the pansori song "Heungboga," promotes the genre through performances and workshops in Europe.

Min's most famous foreign pupil is Anna Yates-Lu, assistant professor of ethnomusicology at the Department of Korean Music of Seoul National University who participated in the "Pansori 20 Hour Relay Project" at the festival.

Min led the workshop while Yates-Lu served as interpreter. When beginning the class, Min said, "You can't become a pansori master in two hours but I'm certain that you can gain the ability to appreciate it."

Explaining the history of pansori, Min showed photos of a performance in stressing the roles of the singer, gosu (drummer) and audience. She said the participants will understand and experience the roles of the three through the workshop.

The first topic was the vocalization methods of a pansori singer, with Min showing those of Namdo pansori, which is unique as it can be learned by merely listening and imitating sounds. A teacher passes down pansori orally to students, so the characteristics of the same song can differ depending on a master singer.

Afterwards, the class received the percussion sheet music for "Heungboga," which tells the story of the protagonist splitting a gourd into two.

"It ranges from the slowest to the fastest part of the song, so foreign nationals can easily learn the various rhythms of pansori," Min said. "Those not fluent in Korean can feel the appeal of pansori more easily through slow rather than fast rhythms."

The percussion section of "Heungboga" when the protagonist splits a gourd in half contains aniri, which is sung without beats in between; jinyangjangdan, the part with the slowest rhythm; and hwimorijangdan, which is fast. Singing pansori made the students appreciate the difficult but fun process of conveying a story and emotions at the same time.

The workshop also covered chuimsae, a form of exclamation during a performance made by the audience matching the story's narration. Participants learned expressions such as "Eolsigu" (Yippee) or "Jotta" (Good) and "Eui" and added them to the parts sung by Min.

Finally, the class explored the roles of a gosu, the drummer who provides the rhythm based on the sounds of a famous pansori singer or makes a chuimsae at the right times. 

"Many foreign visitors come to Korea because of K-pop but many others also come for traditional Korean culture," Min said to conclude her workshop. "I think the number of pansori courses for foreign students like this will probably increase."

Tomomi Nakahara (Japan), who came to the workshop from Namyangju, Gyeonggi-do Province, with a friend, said, "It was really nice to learn a lot about pansori in a short period of time."

"I'm majoring in folklore but actually learned the true sounds of pansori a year after learning its theory," said Kristina Ghevondyan, an international student from Armenia. "It's amazing how master Min introduced the appeal of pansori to foreign nationals in a short period of time."

margareth@korea.kr