'Gagok' composer never stops exploring

Lee An-sam / Courtesy of Lee An-sam

By Nam Hyun-woo

Lee An-sam has been confining his life to strict self-discipline. But, the 73-year-old “gagok” composer has been more than flexible in his music world, continuing pioneering works in the Korean music genre.

Gagok is a genre of vocal music using poetry as its lyrics. Hovering between classical vocal music and pop songs, the genre has given voice to Koreans’ sorrowful sentiment to the accompaniment of western instruments, but lost its ground to the influx of western musical styles in the 1980s and found itself shunned as passé.

For Lee, who has been composing gagok songs since he was 19 and established himself as one of its top composers, it was an intolerable situation that “young students don’t even know what gagok is,” leading him to take various approaches to popularize the genre.

“I came up with clapop around 2007,” said Lee during an interview with The Korea Times. “I tried to blend the melodies, chords, form and rhythms of pop songs into a classic sound so that younger generations can find gagok entertaining and fun.”

In a bid to update gagok and gain recognition abroad, he also wrote some English-lyric clapop songs, such as “Life is” and “O My Hometown,” and which have been performed in Bulgaria, Croatia and the U.S.

On the heels of clapop’s success, he didn’t stop exploring his music frontiers, sticking to a central question -- Why aren’t most gagok songs happy?

“Most traditional songs are based on the sentiment of sorrow,” Lee said. “As the lyrics cry for the loss of our country (Japanese occupation of Korea 1910-45), longing for parents or homesickness, songs naturally become gloomy and sad. Look at the young generations -- they are mostly bright and they feel sad for different reasons from what makes me sad.”

Lee, who has composed more than 300 gagok and 100 chorus songs, brings his latest song “Our Love” to life. The song is his first duet.

The song is based on Seo Young-soon’s lyrics, in which she compares her and her husband’s 30-year-long marriage to a pair of male and female birds each with one eye and one wing who always fly together. The song was released in late August this year, and is scheduled to be performed on Dec. 5 at Cosmos Hall in Seocho, southern Seoul, then on April 26 next year at Sejong Center during the Sinchoon Gagok Festival.

“Usually, it takes 10 to 15 years for a song to enter popular consciousness, but this song rose to the mainstream as soon as it was released,” Lee said. “This shows that what people these days want is an optimistic and relatable story. A poem by a renowned poet does not necessarily become a good song. Such a poem can be an artistic gagok, but it does not always become beloved gagok.”

For Seo, who works as a job manager at the state-run Seoul Dongbu Employment Welfare Service, the song is also the expression of her wish to help dysfunctional families.

“As I interview many people at my work, I happened to know that many families disband due to violence,” Seo said. “The chance of any two people marrying is extremely slim given the world population, but many marriages are falling apart so easily. I wish this song can support couples who can look back on their good memories and keep their marriages happy.” She added that it is okay to change the lyrics “30 years of our marriage” into whatever period the singer wants.

Despite the various works and musical experiments he’s conducted, Lee flatly said he still has so much to learn.

“I will continue my work until my last day,” Lee said. “I eat food because I have to continue my life and I have to feed myself with music to fulfill my soul. Until the moment I die, I will think and do what I can.

“Writers speak with their works and composers speak with their songs. Singers will be applauded and composers will leave their names. That is what I live for,” Lee said.