Ein Nachmittag mit Daegeum und Guqin: Transzendenz, Transgression, Transformation
Traditional music in East Asia fulfilled multiple functions. This afternoon we will play genres such as ritual music, literati music, shamanistic music, folk music, Daoist music and introduce the ideas and techniques behind them. Focus will be put on the relevance of these genres for contemporary music. Free improvisation and an open discussion will round up the afternoon. At the beginning of the event some tea will be served.
About the muscians:
Dasom Baek is a Korean traditional instrument performer and contemporary creator, specializing in daegeum and sogeum(bamboo flutes). She is a certified holder of Korea’s National Intangible Cultural Heritage No. 45: Daegeum Sanjo.
She released her first solo album, “무: Nothingness” in 2020, followed by her second album “Mirror City” in 2023. Her international presence includes performances at major festivals such as SXSW (USA, 2021 & 2024), Rewire Festival (Netherlands, 2022), Freespace Jazz Festival (Hong Kong), Imaterial Festival (Portugal), CINARS Biennale (Canada), and the ACC World Music Festival (Gwangju, Korea).
Dasom focuses on reinterpreting Korea’s unique cultural and traditional music in a contemporary context, blending the essence of classical sound with modern playing techniques. Through this innovative fusion, she creates a new musical language—one that conveys deep emotion and narrative, forging genuine connections with audiences around the world.
백다솜 (Dasom Baek)
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www.dasombaek.com
Wolfgang Schwabe learnt to play qin with the Qin master Ge Hancong (葛瀚聰) in Taiwan. After random performances with LTK, a Taiwanese punk band in the late nineties, he has been regularly performing in Taipei and Berlin playing Echtzeit Musik. In 2018 the CD “180818” with Lin Hui-Chun was released (https://huichunlin.bandcamp.com/album/180818). He is the co-founder of the “International Conference on Guqin, Aesthetics and Humanism” and has published numerous articles on Qin aesthetics. He holds a PhD in Chinese Studies from the Free University of Berlin and a PhD in Philosophy from the National Taiwan University. His translation of the “Aspects of the Qin between Mountains and Streams” (溪山琴況) is to be published in 2026. In 2024 he founded together with Lilia Keller the “Berliner Salon für ostasiatische Kultur” (@berlinsck.bsky.social) which regularly holds events on Chinese music, aesthetics and tea. He is the founder of the “European Academy for Chinese Civilization”, a project still in the making.
In his music he draws on the aesthetics and techniques of the classical qin to confront a contemporary music scene overloaded with dogma. The rich tradition of the qin offers multiple perspectives to connect to non-Western and Western traditions to weave new patterns and create new sounds. The result is music that defines its own context drawing on, but never restricted by various sources. https://wolfgang-schwabe.de/