Under the covers: Image and imagination in Korean popular music albums

1 The basis for this paper is a presentation that was given on October 19, 2012 at Ewha Womans University as part of a conference entitled “The discovery of modernity in East Asian music: The west, tradition and beyond.”

Abstract

Although in-depth research on the topic is relatively rare, music and musical performances should not only be considered to be aural phenomena, but visual ones as well. This paper investigates one specific form of visuality and what can be learned about Korean culture by observing and analyzing album covers of popular female performers from the 1920s to the 1960s, including photographs, art work, and portraiture of the singers. Conclusions can be drawn about the changing society of the time, and the role that music—or more specifically musicians, producers, and the record companies who created the albums and album jackets—played in helping to solidify the notion of modernity in Korea in the first half of the twentieth century and the inextricable position of women in striking a balance between tradition and modernity.

Abstract in Korean

본 주제에 대한 깊은 연구는 이제까지 별로 나온 것이 없다 할지라도, 음악과 연주를 단지 청각적으로만 들을 것이 아니라 시각적인 각도에서도 감상을 해야 한다. 본 논문은 눈으로 보는 특정한 형태에 대해 연구하고 1920년대서부터 1960년대까지 여성 대중 가수들의 앨범커버에 나타나는 사진, 예술적 표현, 가수의 인물 묘사법을 포함한 그 시대의 한국의 문화에 대해 고찰하고 분석해 봄으로서 변화하는 사회 속에서의 음악의 역할에 대해 결론을 낼 수 있다. 좀더 정확하게 말을 하자면, 앨범과 앨범 자켓을 만들어 낸 음악가, 프로듀서, 및 음반 회사들이 20세기 초반 반 세기 동안 한국에서의 현대화를 고착시키는데 있어서 어떻게 도움을 주었는지, 전통과 현대 간의 현저한 차이의 균형을 맞추는데 불가분한 여성의 지위가 어떠했는지 알 수 있다.

Keywords:

• Korea
• modernity
• album covers
• New Woman
• music (teuroteu—trot)

Keywords:

• 한국
• 현대성
• 앨범 자켓
• 신여성
• 트로트

Notes on contributor

Heather A. WILLOUGHBY received her Ph.D. from Columbia University in Ethnomusicology. Recent research and publishing efforts focus on the Korean narrative genre of pansori, gender and image issues in Korean popular musics, and community development in Cambodia. She is employed as an Associate Professor of Cultural Anthropology in the Graduate School of International Studies at Ewha Womans University where she teaches courses dealing with gender and world music, comparative culture, Korean cultural history, East Asian philosophy, and gender studies of East Asia.

Notes

1 The basis for this paper is a presentation that was given on October 19, 2012 at Ewha Womans University as part of a conference entitled “The discovery of modernity in East Asian music: The west, tradition and beyond.”

2. When scholars speak of “modernization” they primarily focus on economic, political and social transformations. My interest is the latter, more specifically the ways in which cultural norms began to change, develop, and progress in the beginning of the twentieth century in Korea.

3. For a more complete history of the beginnings and influence of female popular singers, see Kim (2000) and Son (2006).

4. In some instances, the performers’ names were Romanized on the album jackets, or they were written about in non-Korean media. In such cases, I used the popular spelling of their names; however, I also include in parentheses the transliteration of their name according to the Korean Government's Revised Romanization of Hangeul.

5. Pansori is a solo narrative folk genre dating back to the mid-eighteenth century. Even in most contemporary performances a female singer will wear a traditional hanbok and comb her hair very tightly against her scalp with a distinct part in the middle. She will also likely wear a jjok (chignon) at the nape of her neck. In Lee Nan-young's case, her hair is pulled back, but with significantly more volume in the front.

6. In this passage, Kim is relating the experiences of a fictional character (Ongnyeon from Yi Injik's story Hyeoleuinu). She explains, that Ongnyeon “is subject to rituals that strip her of all markers, in this case Korean dress, deeming her as uncivilized, as a prelude to her formal entry into the ‘civilized’ space that is ‘modern’ Japan (2007: 622). Nevertheless, it can be extrapolated that experiences such as this were not uncommon among Koreans visiting Japan and the West during the modernization period of the turn-of-the-century.

7. Actually, there is one other very minute difference between the two photos: in the first, the otgoreum (ribbon) on her hanbok is tied with the bow facing toward her left, and in the latter it is toward the right, indicating that they truly are two separate pictures though otherwise almost indistinguishable.

8. Columbia Records introduced 33^1/3 RPM Vinyl LP (Long Play) records in 1948, but it was not until the early 1960s that the format became predominant in the music industry (Record Collectors Guild, 2014).

9. The Emille Bell, also known as The Sacred Bell of Great King Seongdeok, was completed in the year 771 and is designated as Korea National Treasure No. 29. The relief of the two apsaras (female spirits of clouds and water in Hinduism and Buddhism) on the bell would readily be recognized by a majority of Koreans of all ages (Cultural Heritage Administration of Korea, n.d.).

10. The first is titled and subtitled, “Choi Suk-ja Geoljakseonjip: Samdoda Sosik” (“Choi Suk-ja Masterpiece Collection: Wind, Women, and Stone News”). The song title, which has been recorded by numerous famous trot singers, Sam-da-do Sosik or Wind, Women and Stone News refers to the three things that are said to be readily found on Jeju Island. The second album is also called “Choi Suk-ja Geoljakseonjip” (“Choi Suk-ja Masterpiece Collection”), but with the primary song title being “Sangcheo badeun Miryeon” (“Feelings of Regret”).