Crossover band La Baie mixes Chopin, electropop
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Denis Sungho, right, of Crossover band “La Baie” / Courtesy of the artist
By Park Jin-hai
Classical guitarist Denis Sungho Janssens, who received much attention here for his musical talent as well as his personal background as a Korean adoptee to Belgium, has formed the unique crossover band La Baie.
The trio of producer and guitarist Janssens, jazz vocalist Kim Hye-mi and pianist Park Jin-woo recently released their first project album “La Baie,” the French word for a bay, named after the band.
Like a bay, a body of water connected to an ocean, Janssens says Chopin’s melody is connected to the electropop his band plays.
“La Baie is in a totally different musical genre from the mainstream and I coined the phrase ‘chic and pop’ for it,” said Janssens during a recent interview with The Korea Times. “We decided to go into a market that is very different from the mass market. It’s new classical. In Europe, this kind of music is very famous, but in Asia it is not well known. We are pioneers in this kind of music.”
Janssens, who won Belgium's national “Young Talent” competition when he was 14, has held recitals in prestigious halls, including Carnegie Hall in New York. Ever since visiting Korea for the first time in 2006, he has returned numerous times for concerts and collaborated with diva Sumi Jo for her 2014 Korean tour.
Borrowing the famous melodies of Chopin, the band arranges them smartly as electronic music pieces. Co-produced by Gioacchino Maurici, who wrote for Celine Dion, the band members carry rhythms and musical colors closer to pop and electronic, but keep their roots near classical music.
Janssens says Chopin is very international and his melodies are very easy and deep. “Everybody knows Chopin’s melody. Even when you go to the bathroom, there’s Chopin sometimes. In order to make our album a commercial success, people need to recognize the melody but nobody should know it has come from Chopin,” he said. “It’s not like, say, Beethoven, dramatic, or Mahler, very romantic. Chopin is more nostalgic.”
All seven tracks have either partly mixed or wholly rearranged the melody of the classic artist. Kim’s vocal sounds are unique and mysterious, both in Korean and English, and Janssens adds French narration.
“A lot of people these days try to sing in English. But it’s not a good solution, because the American market wants American English. To succeed there, you need to be different,” he said.
In Europe, he says Korea is regarded as something new and trendy as much as Japan was in the 1980s. Citing that Korean-letter tattoos are considered hip among his European friends, Janssens says that Korea is super trendy.
“What is famous in Europe is K-pop, but they are waiting for something different. I put Korean language in the songs because I love the sound. It is beautiful _ very rhythmical, very noisy and melodic. For me, French doesn’t have any melody and is very flat. But Korean is like a song to me.”
Riding on the popularity of hallyu, or Korean wave, the band is targeting Asian and European markets. The band is scheduled to launch Japan and China tours next year. Saying that the China tour was arranged before the band began recording, the band has high hopes for the Chinese market.
“Chinese organizers showed great interest in us, even when we only had the concept for the album, because it is a Korean-French project, both of which are regarded as super trendy in China,” he said. “But, first we need to make noise here in Korea. That could bring us to France. It will take time. It’s a long term plan.”
The band will perform tracks from “La Baie” at Olympus Hall in Samseong-dong, southern Seoul, on June 30 and July 1. Tickets cost 44,000 won. For more information, visit Olympus Hall’s website at www.olympushall.co.kr or call (02) 6255-3270.