PARK JIHA - Forced Exposure

$15.50 IN STOCK

The luminous third album from the acclaimed Korean multi-instrumentalist and composer Park Jiha. The beauty of light is the inspiration for The Gleam. Park Jiha distills light into sound, from the first flicker of morning on the horizon in "At Dawn" all the way to the moment when full darkness falls again in "Nightfall Dancer", capturing the essence of it in notes and silence. The album had its origin with the piece "Temporary Inertia", which was created for a performance as "a meditative improvisation in a bunker designed by the architect Ando Tadao, where the ceiling had an open light way going across the room..." Like its predecessor, Philos (GB 077CD/LP), The Gleam is a completely solo work, all the music composed and played by Park Jiha on the piri, a type of oboe, the saenghwang, a mouth organ, the hammered dulcimer known as the yanggeum, and glockenspiel. There's a stark clarity to the sound, yet it's never spare or empty. There's a searching warmth to what she does. It's minimal without being minimalist, occasionally presenting itself with the formality of traditional Korean music that is her background, although she feels that the distance she's put between herself and that teaching is "really what made my music what it is now". At other times her playing is an improvisation that spirals free into the sky. It all comes together into a beautiful whole and it always flows with a natural rhythm. Like everything, it breathes. The music on The Gleam often surprises, as instruments take on different colors and shades. Nowhere is that more evident than on "Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans", a composition created as a live soundtrack for a movie of the same name, a silent black-and-white film. The effect of dividing the piri melody into two parts shimmers, and is both intimate and quietly flickering, like light itself. Across The Gleam, the music patiently shifts moods, from the soft serenity of "At Dawn" to the playful, sparkling dance that marks "A Day In..." as the rhythm carries it along. Nothing is rushed. Much of that sense is due to the way she composes. Working with textures and layers in a piece until it breathes, until it's ready. There was another, inevitable factor involved in the creation process of The Gleam: Covid-19. The global pandemic meant that the performance of "Temporary Inertia" was pushed back until Oct. 2020. The music had already been gestating for a while, with some pieces written a couple of years earlier, but the long break offered her more chance to slowly shape the album.

$24.00 IN STOCK

LP version. The luminous third album from the acclaimed Korean multi-instrumentalist and composer Park Jiha. The beauty of light is the inspiration for The Gleam. Park Jiha distills light into sound, from the first flicker of morning on the horizon in "At Dawn" all the way to the moment when full darkness falls again in "Nightfall Dancer", capturing the essence of it in notes and silence. The album had its origin with the piece "Temporary Inertia", which was created for a performance as "a meditative improvisation in a bunker designed by the architect Ando Tadao, where the ceiling had an open light way going across the room..." Like its predecessor, Philos (GB 077CD/LP), The Gleam is a completely solo work, all the music composed and played by Park Jiha on the piri, a type of oboe, the saenghwang, a mouth organ, the hammered dulcimer known as the yanggeum, and glockenspiel. There's a stark clarity to the sound, yet it's never spare or empty. There's a searching warmth to what she does. It's minimal without being minimalist, occasionally presenting itself with the formality of traditional Korean music that is her background, although she feels that the distance she's put between herself and that teaching is "really what made my music what it is now". At other times her playing is an improvisation that spirals free into the sky. It all comes together into a beautiful whole and it always flows with a natural rhythm. Like everything, it breathes. The music on The Gleam often surprises, as instruments take on different colors and shades. Nowhere is that more evident than on "Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans", a composition created as a live soundtrack for a movie of the same name, a silent black-and-white film. The effect of dividing the piri melody into two parts shimmers, and is both intimate and quietly flickering, like light itself. Across The Gleam, the music patiently shifts moods, from the soft serenity of "At Dawn" to the playful, sparkling dance that marks "A Day In..." as the rhythm carries it along. Nothing is rushed. Much of that sense is due to the way she composes. Working with textures and layers in a piece until it breathes, until it's ready. There was another, inevitable factor involved in the creation process of The Gleam: Covid-19. The global pandemic meant that the performance of "Temporary Inertia" was pushed back until Oct. 2020. The music had already been gestating for a while, with some pieces written a couple of years earlier, but the long break offered her more chance to slowly shape the album.

$15.50 IN STOCK

Park Jiha's debut album Communion (GB 057CD/LP) -- released internationally by tak:til in 2018 -- drew well deserved attention to the young Korean instrumentalist/composer's vivid sound world. The widely acclaimed album graced 2018 critics lists at The Wire, Pop Matters, and the Guardian. Her new album Philos -- which she calls an evocation of her "love for time, space and sound" -- is every bit as inventive, elegant, and transcendent as her debut. While Park Jiha's music is often contextualized by its kinship with minimalism, ambient, and chamber jazz, her creative backbone is Korean traditional music. Jiha formally studied both its theory and practice and has mastered three of its most emblematic instruments: Piri (double reed bamboo flute), saenghwang (mouth organ), and yanggeum (hammered dulcimer). On Communion, Park Jiha wove these ancient instruments into an ensemble sound that included other musicians contributing on vibraphone, saxophone, bass clarinet, and percussion. The effect felt revelatory; it seemed to naturally evoke Jon Hassell's "Fourth World" ethos, morphing across time and tradition. Philos is both an extension of, and a swerve away from, her previous record. It shares its predecessor's patience and deeply resonant hypnotic effects. It similarly looks to the future, while continuing to converse with a rich instrumental language from the past. But the overall tone and intent feels much more interior and personal -- more rarefied. Whereas Communion featured the classic sound field of a group of musicians playing in a room, Philos trades that for more density and concentration. Each sound has been given the artist's full attention. In Greek, "Philos" is the plural for "philo" which can mean "love" or "the liking of a specified thing." The album's compositions include "Arrival", which slowly introduces every sound featured on the record. The gift of unexpected rain in the heat of midsummer is heard on "Thunder Shower". "Easy" is a poem written and recited by the Lebanese artist Dima El Sayed who visited Korea to participate in the Hwaeom Spiritual Music Ritual and was inspired by Park Jiha's work. The title track "Philos" was created by overlapping sounds and stretching time. "Walker: In Seoul" evokes the vivid soundscape of the city in which Jiha lives. "When I Think If Her" features the ghostly melodies of the yanggeum and saenghwang. Park Jiha reaches for a sturdy simplicity. A borderless connection between her life and her accomplished musical art.

$23.50 IN STOCK

Restocked; LP version. 180 gram vinyl. Includes download code. Park Jiha's debut album Communion (GB 057CD/LP) -- released internationally by tak:til in 2018 -- drew well deserved attention to the young Korean instrumentalist/composer's vivid sound world. The widely acclaimed album graced 2018 critics lists at The Wire, Pop Matters, and the Guardian. Her new album Philos -- which she calls an evocation of her "love for time, space and sound" -- is every bit as inventive, elegant, and transcendent as her debut. While Park Jiha's music is often contextualized by its kinship with minimalism, ambient, and chamber jazz, her creative backbone is Korean traditional music. Jiha formally studied both its theory and practice and has mastered three of its most emblematic instruments: Piri (double reed bamboo flute), saenghwang (mouth organ), and yanggeum (hammered dulcimer). On Communion, Park Jiha wove these ancient instruments into an ensemble sound that included other musicians contributing on vibraphone, saxophone, bass clarinet, and percussion. The effect felt revelatory; it seemed to naturally evoke Jon Hassell's "Fourth World" ethos, morphing across time and tradition. Philos is both an extension of, and a swerve away from, her previous record. It shares its predecessor's patience and deeply resonant hypnotic effects. It similarly looks to the future, while continuing to converse with a rich instrumental language from the past. But the overall tone and intent feels much more interior and personal -- more rarefied. Whereas Communion featured the classic sound field of a group of musicians playing in a room, Philos trades that for more density and concentration. Each sound has been given the artist's full attention. In Greek, "Philos" is the plural for "philo" which can mean "love" or "the liking of a specified thing." The album's compositions include "Arrival", which slowly introduces every sound featured on the record. The gift of unexpected rain in the heat of midsummer is heard on "Thunder Shower". "Easy" is a poem written and recited by the Lebanese artist Dima El Sayed who visited Korea to participate in the Hwaeom Spiritual Music Ritual and was inspired by Park Jiha's work. The title track "Philos" was created by overlapping sounds and stretching time. "Walker: In Seoul" evokes the vivid soundscape of the city in which Jiha lives. "When I Think If Her" features the ghostly melodies of the yanggeum and saenghwang. Park Jiha reaches for a sturdy simplicity. A borderless connection between her life and her accomplished musical art.

$15.50 IN STOCK

"I don't want to play only traditional music. I want to play my own music... my own stories." --Park Jiha

Over the last few years a rising tide of new Korean artists have staked a place in the global music conversation. Groups like Jambinai, Black String and Park Jiha's earlier duo 숨[suːm] have created exciting soundworlds that deftly combine the instrumentation and complex expression of Korean traditional music with an array of contemporary sounds such as post-rock, doom metal, downtempo jazz, and classical minimalism. While Park Jiha's most recent musical endeavor, her debut solo album Communion, is another decisive step towards a more personal and forward-looking musical vocabulary, it also is deeply rooted in her traditional music education and background. Jiha's main instrument is the piri, a traditional Korean instrument which is like an oboe. She also plays the saenghwang, a traditional instrument similar to a mouth organ and made of bamboo, the yanggeum (hammered dulcimer), and percussion. Park Jiha started her music career by founding the duo 숨[suːm] with Jungmin Seo in 2007 -- after she had finished her musical studies. 숨[suːm]'s music, composed with an array of traditional instruments and buoyed by unorthodox musical structures, was an immediate and profound influence on the new Korean music scene. The duo released the album Rhythmic Space: A Pause For Breath in 2010, and 숨[suːm] 2nd in 2014. But Park Jiha began to hear a much different music -- one that directly interacted with more distant sound traditions and a more eclectic instrumental palette. Putting 숨[suːm] on pause for the moment, she started collaborating with John Bell (vibraphone) and Kim Oki (bass clarinet, saxophone) to create Communion, her first solo album. Originally released in Korea in 2016, the album's compositions are sometimes hushed and other times slowly swelling and dynamic. It skillfully unites hypnotic minimalism and experimental strategies with Park Jiha's distinctive mastery of the piri, saenghwang, and yanggeum. "The Longing of the Yawning Divide" is inspired by the solemnity and resonance of a monastery in Leuven, Belgium. "All Souls' Day" constructs harmony and rhythmic lift between an unlikely grouping of instruments: the yanggeum, piri, saxophone, vibraphone, and the jing. The album's opening composition, "Throughout The Night" is a precise and keening dialogue between the piri and the bass clarinet.

$23.50 NOT IN STOCK

LP version. 180 gram vinyl; Includes download code. "I don't want to play only traditional music. I want to play my own music... my own stories." --Park Jiha

Over the last few years a rising tide of new Korean artists have staked a place in the global music conversation. Groups like Jambinai, Black String and Park Jiha's earlier duo 숨[suːm] have created exciting soundworlds that deftly combine the instrumentation and complex expression of Korean traditional music with an array of contemporary sounds such as post-rock, doom metal, downtempo jazz, and classical minimalism. While Park Jiha's most recent musical endeavor, her debut solo album Communion, is another decisive step towards a more personal and forward-looking musical vocabulary, it also is deeply rooted in her traditional music education and background. Jiha's main instrument is the piri, a traditional Korean instrument which is like an oboe. She also plays the saenghwang, a traditional instrument similar to a mouth organ and made of bamboo, the yanggeum (hammered dulcimer), and percussion. Park Jiha started her music career by founding the duo 숨[suːm] with Jungmin Seo in 2007 -- after she had finished her musical studies. 숨[suːm]'s music, composed with an array of traditional instruments and buoyed by unorthodox musical structures, was an immediate and profound influence on the new Korean music scene. The duo released the album Rhythmic Space: A Pause For Breath in 2010, and 숨[suːm] 2nd in 2014. But Park Jiha began to hear a much different music -- one that directly interacted with more distant sound traditions and a more eclectic instrumental palette. Putting 숨[suːm] on pause for the moment, she started collaborating with John Bell (vibraphone) and Kim Oki (bass clarinet, saxophone) to create Communion, her first solo album. Originally released in Korea in 2016, the album's compositions are sometimes hushed and other times slowly swelling and dynamic. It skillfully unites hypnotic minimalism and experimental strategies with Park Jiha's distinctive mastery of the piri, saenghwang, and yanggeum. "The Longing of the Yawning Divide" is inspired by the solemnity and resonance of a monastery in Leuven, Belgium. "All Souls' Day" constructs harmony and rhythmic lift between an unlikely grouping of instruments: the yanggeum, piri, saxophone, vibraphone, and the jing. The album's opening composition, "Throughout The Night" is a precise and keening dialogue between the piri and the bass clarinet.