Hyelim Kim: Women Make Music
Soundscapes of the Wind: Hyelim Kim’s Taegŭm Project
For PRS’s ‘The Women Make Music 2020’, Hyelim Kim will create an audio-visual experience using the taegŭm flute to interact and juxtapose with the surrounding landscapes and soundscapes of the natural and urban environment. This project will also explore how the non-Western female voice could express itself within the often overwhelming cosmopolitan environment of the West (in this case, the UK), where it could easily be drowned.
Kim is a taegŭm performer, composer and researcher who has been receiving widespread acclaim for opening new possibilities for Korean music on an international level. The taegŭm, a horizontal bamboo flute, is considered one of the most representative of Korea’s traditional instruments. She has won prizes at various major taegŭm competitions, including the Gold Medal at the Korean National Taegŭm Competition and the 1st prize at the Korean National Chongro Music Competition. Since moving to the UK, Kim has held numerous performances overseas including solo recitals and performances at the London Jazz Festival (UK), the International Beijing Bamboo Flute Festival (China), the Melbourne Women’s Jazz Festival (Australia), the Creativity Unlimited Festival (Australia) and the NZEMS (New Zealand), and is a regular member of the Third Orchestra (Barbican Art Centre). She obtained her PhD in ethnomusicology from SOAS in 2014, where her dissertation was on the practice-as-research of Korean traditional music, which is currently being prepared for publication by Routledge. She is currently a visiting research fellow at Bath Spa University.