composer
by DaEun Jung, with Melody Shim
A dance quartet combining traditional Korean dance with chance operations and contemporary dance.
The music combines Lou Harrison’s National Resophonic Guitar with electronics and the powerful pansori voice of Melody Shim.
LA Dance Chronicle: “…mesmerizing… wonderful…”
Stage and Cinema: “… a mind fuck.”
What would happen if the conventional flow of Korean dance is disrupted Prompted by this question, dancer-choreographer DaEun Jung has built a compositional system inspired by Merce Cunningham’s “chance operation” and the Korean alphabet, Hangul. Assigning the segmented moves of classical Korean dance to each morpho-syllabic block of the alphabet, Byoul Part 1: 246 at 40—consisting of 246 syllables, moves, and beats at 40 bpm—finds Jung, pansori singer Melody Shim, and sound composer Daniel Corral exploring concurrences of rigor upon arbitrary, spontaneity upon rules, flow upon interruption, dependency upon idiosyncrasy, and the conditional upon the absolute.
Choreographed and Performed by DaEun Jung
Vocals: Melody H. Sim (Shim)
Composer/Sound Design/Video Design: Daniel Corral
Costume Design: Alice Park
Scenic Concept: Haeshin Park
Director of Photography: Chantal Cherry
Video Editor: Scarlett Kim
Associate Video Editor: Anthony Storniolo
Sound Recording: Sung Ryeol Kim
Special thanks to Alexander Gedeon, Tom Byun, and Rosanna Gamson for your generous support, time, and space
A collaboration with performer/director Alexander Gedeon, Concerto for Having Fun with Elvis on Stage combines live music and theatrical performance to reframe the cultural significance of the “worst album in rock and roll history.”
“Having Fun with Elvis on Stage” is a 1973 album collaged entirely from Elvis speaking on stage between songs at live concerts – no music. AllMusic’s Mark Deming declared “hearing it is like witnessing a car wreck, leaving onlookers too horrified and too baffled to turn away.” Concerto for Having Fun with Elvis on Stage reimagines this vilified recording as the libretto for a sort of ghost opera, combining pop art nostalgia with new technology and classical instruments to create a memetic hologram of the endless purgatory of celebrity afterlife.
My live musical score is performed along with the original LP as if they were the pit orchestra for opera or musical theater – sometimes harmonizing with the words, painting emotions in the spaces between, or reacting theatrically. Meanwhile, Gedeon’s “Elvis” persona becomes a vehicle to explore all things banal and absurd in pop idolatry, as well as the performative aspects of ‘stage presence.’
Sequenza 21: “…carried off with exemplary production values and extraordinary performances, making the case that new music concerts can be experienced online at a high level.”
LA Times Cultural Pick: “Theater artist Alexander Gedeon and composer Daniel Corral deconstruct the myth of pop stardom in this musical fable with live accompaniment by the Now Hear Ensemble.”
LA Weekly: Arts Calendar Highlight
Pastoral works to revise the stories I grew up with: American tropes of manifest destiny, untroubled and unlimited resources, and selective invisibilities. I am making this dance to replace those stories, with new and necessary ones. Monuments decay, inhabitable land shrinks, walls become flesh, and we consider what it means to run (away). The spatial frame of the dance shifts from iconic American landscapes to unencumbered, unbounded spaces in which dancers are unmoored and adrift. Mortal time is brief. There is only time to tell new stories and cherish fleeting moments. – VIC
Choreographic Direction by Victoria Marks
Visuals by Isla Hansen
Lighting by Arsenio Apillanes
Sound by Daniel Corral
Choreographic Assistance by Sarah Jacobs
Featuring: Dezaré Foster, DaEun Jung, Aaron Mason, Alexx Shilling, Willy Souly, Tom Tsai
LA Dance Chronicle: “Pastoral takes the early 20th century concept of Americana worship and shatters it — rightfully so. Though things have never fully been fair, the once tangible idea of ‘making it’ has become almost entirely fantastical, as we struggle to find out place in this land.”
Created by Christine Marie.
Music by Daniel Corral, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, and Laaraji.
Features excerpt from my pieces Polytope, Diamond Pulses, and One Line
Variety: “The vivid choreography and score leave a lasting impression within one’s psyche…”
NBC: Sundance Film Festival ASCAP 21st Anniversary Lineup
Cool Hunting: “Marie’s work reminds all visitors of the power in exploring all manners of reality modification.”
Directed by Bo Sul Kim
Choreographed by Nick Bruder
Dance by Robin Wilson
Music by Daniel Corral
“Shadow, My Shadow” is a multimedia performance that follows a girl on her path to self-discovery with choreography, video and drawn animation. Lost beneath layers of worldly masks she seeks to find her true self and plunges deep into the fathoms of her mind, the consciousness of her soul. At the bottom of this ocean she encounters a mysterious creature: her own shadow.