All Living Things

Description

Acclaimed Korean composer and multi-instrumentalist Park Jiha creates patient, immersive music that illuminates the essence and texture of the natural and living world. On her fourth album, All Living Things, her mastery of traditional Korean instruments is intimately woven into deeply personal compositions and a deft use of contemporary sounds. Terms such as “post-classical,” “ambient,” or even “cinematic” are useful, but they only scratch the surface of the shimmering, contemplative sound world of this album. Like its critically acclaimed predecessors, Philos (2018) and The Gleam (2022), All Living Things sees her playing all the instruments, meticulously layered in the studio to create sumptuous soundscapes. Once again, drawing on her background in traditional Korean music, she employs an array of instruments unfamiliar to most Western listeners: the piri (a kind of oboe); the yanggeum (a hammered dulcimer); the saenghwang (a large wooden mouth organ). Alongside these, we can also hear flute, glockenspiel, bells, her voice, and, crucially, electronics. It is an enticing uncertainty that makes Park Jiha’s music so undefinable. Sure, there are allusions to minimalism in the delicate repetitive motifs and percussive cycles. And sure, traditional Korean music provides the foundation. But there is also the dreamy breath of ambient, the spiritual sincerity of New Age, the formal precision of contemporary classical music, and the spontaneity of experimental jazz.