LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Long before K-pop took off, it was South Korea's classical musicians who were rocking the music world. NPR's Anthony Kuhn reports on an historic Italian opera house that's been around for nearly 2 1/2 centuries and has chosen a Korean maestro to lead it for the first time.
ANTHONY KUHN, BYLINE: Milan's Teatro alla Scala announced that renowned conductor Chung Myung-Whun will take over in 2027 and serve as music director until 2030. Chung is the second youngest of seven kids in a prodigiously musical family. He made his public debut as a pianist at age 7. At 8, he moved to the U.S. In 1969, he performed in Arensky piano trio on "The Ed Sullivan Show" with his two diva-esque sisters, violinist Chung Kyung-Wha and cellist Chung Myung-Wha.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHUNG MYUNG-WHUN, CHUNG KYUNG-WHA AND CHUNG MYUNG-WHA PERFORMANCE OF ARENSKY'S "PIANO TRIO NO. 1, OP. 32")
KUHN: Chung Myung-Whun studied conducting at The Juilliard School in New York in the 1970s. In a statement, La Scala described Chung as one of the most beloved artists among the Milanese public. Since 1989, Chung has conducted 141 concerts with La Scala. Chung told a recent press conference in Busan about his new job.
(SOUNDBITE OF PRESS CONFERENCE)
CHUNG MYUNG-WHUN: (Speaking Korean).
KUHN: "It feels like getting married," he said, "after loving each other for 36 years." Chung says he's especially fond of Giuseppe Verdi's operas, several of which debuted at La Scala.
(SOUNDBITE OF PRESS CONFERENCE)
CHUNG: There are two operas that I particularly love. One is "Don Carlos"...
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "DON CARLOS")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST: (As character, singing in non-English language).
(SOUNDBITE OF PRESS CONFERENCE)
CHUNG: ...And the other one is "Simon Boccanegra."
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "SIMON BOCCANEGRA")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP #1: (As characters, singing in non-English language).
(SOUNDBITE OF PRESS CONFERENCE)
CHUNG: The "Simon Boccanegra" is a personal favorite, particularly because of the title character, Boccanegra, who embodies what a great man should be. The generosity, the warmth - that comes through.
KUHN: Since Chung Myung-Whun's rise to fame, younger South Korean musicians have claimed an outsized share of prizes in international competition. Shin Soo-Jung is professor emeritus at Seoul National University, a pianist and friend of Chung Myung-Whun's family. She sees three key ingredients behind South Korea's success.
SHIN SOO-JUNG: No. 1, Korean folk, they have really artistic temperament, improvisation and expression of feeling and that kind of thing. And then No. 2 is there's always supporting parents, especially mother.
KUHN: And the third thing is South Korea's growing economic clout, which has enabled young talents to study overseas. After decades of performing in Europe, Chung Myung-Whun returned to Korea in 2005 and focused on fostering new talent and musical exchanges. He says he admires maestros like Verdi for their contributions to humanitarian causes.
(SOUNDBITE OF PRESS CONFERENCE)
CHUNG: His greatest work was that before he died and many years before, he prepared a retirement home for musicians, which he built in Milan, and he dedicated all his royalties to this place.
KUHN: Chung notes that Koreans and Italians have a lot in common - how they express their emotions, their love of singing. Both live on peninsulas jutting off the Eurasian landmass. For centuries before 1871, Italy was a divided nation. Korea was divided in 1945 and still is. Italy's reunification had a sort of unofficial anthem - Giuseppe Verdi's opera, "Nabucco," which premiered at La Scala in 1842. Chung Myung-Whun has conducted his famous aria, "Va, Pensiero."
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "VA, PENSIERO")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP #2: (As characters, singing in non-English language).
KUHN: Chung Myung-Whun's humanitarian cause has been to reunify North and South through music. His concerts have raised money for North Korean children. In 2017, he created the One Korea Orchestra. But for now, ties between the two Koreas are in a deep freeze, and the prospect of Chung Myung-Whun conducting an inter-Korean orchestra seems distant.
Anthony Kuhn, NPR News, Busan.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "VA, PENSIERO")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP #2: (As characters, singing in non-English language). Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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