I’m so awed by the talents of the people here!! Here’s our very own resident composer @Snow Flower with her original piece. Thank you, @Snow Flower.
-pm3
@Snow Flower writes:
Here is a piano piece I composed recently. I don’t know how to call it yet. I am thinking Frozen Time or Mirror of Solitude, but I am open to other suggestions. It is definitely not a party song.
It is more suitable for a poetry reading session with Lady Noh. Thank you!
https://soundcloud.com/user-858010722/mystery
Here are the Kim Sowol’s poems read in this kdrama.
Invocation of the Dead
Oh, name shattered.
Oh, name that parted in the air.
Oh, name without an owner.
Oh, name I will call until I die.
I won’t finish the last words
I had in my heart.
The one I loved.
The one I loved.
(source: Netflix)
My House
…When the sun goes down over the white rapids,
I shall wait by the gate.
Between the shadows of the birds singing at dawn,
I see the world brightening up in its still calmness.
With my eyes fixated on the traveler passing by
At the break of dawn
I wonder,
Is that you? Is that you?
(source: Netflix)
The Stream
What is your reason for doing that?
Sitting alone by the stream.
The green grass was sprouting
and the water was splashing from the spring breeze.
You promised that even if you go,
You won’t be gone forever.
That is what you promised.
I sit by the stream each day
And think about it endlessly:
When you promised that even if you go,
You won’t be gone forever,
Were you asking me not to forget you?
(source: Netflix)
O Mother, O Sister
O, Mother O sister, let us live by the river.
Where golden sands glitter in the garden,
and beyond the back gate, the reeds are singing…
O mother, O sister, let us live by the river.
(source: Kuroshio’s post. Translation: David McCann)
Wow! Great! All put together. Thanks as always @pkml3!! 😘
Mirror of Solitude or Hope or Waiting? The pauses build up the anticipation. I can imagine listening to your beautiful composition and reading listening to a recitation of the poems. Sometimes I feel like these poems are for Lady Noh her waiting for her loved one left behind in ROK, or thinking of her loved one whom she left behind. Most times I feel like this is TE’s poem as she waited months for LG.
Except for Invocation of the Dead, the other poems refer to the river/stream/rapids. The poet does not move from where he/she waits, but the water (or time/people/life) continues to flow constantly.
@Snowflower, I am loving your compositions (including Evening Star), they are so soothing and there are hopeful parts. Can’t help but to listen to them on repeat!
Dear @packmule3 and @Snow Flower, I amstarting my day with this glorious music. It’s a wondrrful mood piece. @Snow Flower, I think as the composer of this piece, your title suggestions are in keeping with the feelings your music invokes. And @packmule3, I am grateful for this blog for reintroducing me to the beauty of poetry. It seems to me that in the U.S., poetry has become a lost art, except when it comes to hip hop (where the intellectuals seem to ignore it, except for Hamilton). But, I don’t think published poets make too much money-especially compared to best selling authors). It just seems to me that Asian culture still reveres poetry (including hip hop too-in kpop and osts-without being cultural appropriation).I go on too long. Bitches Over Drama is a wonderful source for inspiration, beauty, laughter, tears and evety emotion, while providing a safe space for civil discussion. And, for me, who has nobody in my circle of friends even willing to try K dramas and movies, a place to participate in my new sourcebof joy and comfort.This particular post brings home how special this site is. Namaste, Shalom, Danke, Merci, Gracias, Gamsamnidha….
Wow, @Snow Flower thank you for sharing this. It goes straight to my heart. The composition brings about the feeling of waiting for something, anticipation of the unknown. Thank you again! 🙂
This is beautiful @Snow Flower. You have a real talent at composing music! I love how the music flows frok very slow to slow and then to a faster rhythm, somehow mirroring emotions. And zi like how you have added the tune of Maze into it..so awesome 😍😍
Here again to say it’s great! 😉
Well done, @Snow Flower!
The melancholy tone of the piece fits well into your theme of solitude/reflection.
@oldamericanlady how I relate as being a 70s something woman in NWA who has found a treasure trove of delightful memories by seeing these Kdramas. @packmule3 you have created such a delightful blog here. Thank you so much for all the joy of this during the King eternal.
My goodness @Snow Flower. The chords in the background sounding much like the chimes of a clock. Time…ticking…keeping the tempo… and LG/TE and the like jumping in and out with variations. It’s beautifully melancholic. ❤️
@packmule3 thank you for setting up a corner for poetry and music compositions! It’s a quiet good space to lounge in.
@Snowflower your composition is prefect for the deep melancholy and endless loneliness in Kim Sowol’s poems.
I love the start and end parts where your single chord just marches on.
@old American lady I echo your sentiments! I really enjoy this special blog of @packmule3. Here I find good answers and explanations and fun gifs to complete my k drama viewing. I too don’t have any like minded friends who would bother to “dig around” so much for a drama. I learnt so much more about the sublime details that I would have missed out if not for the hawk eyed contributors here. I used to go to dramabeans and koala’s playground to gain new insights when I get confused or the subtitles didnt do its job well enough but it’s been dismal over there lately.I really miss javabeans and headsno2 and girlfriday from the old dramabeans period😥 where are they now? Would you know @packmule3?
@Carolstar About DB’s Javabeans and GirlFriday, by some lovely coincidence, they were on Swoon and reviewing the first 2 episodes of TKEM!!!
They have ‘sold’ DB to an independent group and are no longer on DB, except that their past posts are all archived and retained. No clue what HeadsNo2 is doing. They all had to get regular jobs, I think, and that left no time for running the blog, when it got too big.
Here they are just a couple of months ago, as themselves, Jen and Sarah.
Wow! Thanks for this @Snowflower! 🙌🏻 It’s lovely.
I can imagine this not just with Lady Noh’s poetry reading but when LG goes through No Man’s Land while trying to open doors to different worlds and longing for TE at the same time.
Yes, @agdr03 This truly evokes Lady Noh gently reciting poetry under a full moon sitting by the shrine. It’s just my romantic heart but I would secretly have liked her getting together with Prince Buyrong in the end🙈🙈🙈 I have this terrible tendency to try matching all possible couples in my head😝😝😝
Oh my goodness! High five girlfriend! 🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻 I would have paired them up too @Phoenix. I was heartbroken especially seeing Lady Noh cry buckets when he died. 😭
@ GB Thank you!😙 You really are my dependable Fairy of Answers!I will go check out The Swoon.
@Phoenix and @agdr03 I am with you both about Lady Noh and Prince Buyrong they would have been like “loving grandparents” to TE and King LG’s children in another time line or universe!
@Snow Flower, those four notes at the beginning of your piano piece make me think of the four beginning lines of Kim Sowol’s poem Invocation of the Dead. Your notes are the name we don’t hear spoken.
Beautiful piece, @Snow Flower!
I purchased Azaleas: A Book of Poems by Kim Sowol as translated by David R. McCann. I was surprised to learn that Invocation for the Dead as presented in TKEM is a portion of a longer poem. Here’s the whole poem as translated by McCann. I’m not as fond of his translation as I am of what we saw in the TKEM subtitles.
Invocation
O name broken in pieces!
O name dispersed into the emptiness!
O name I call that no one owns!
O name that I will die calling!
Even at the last I could not say
the one word left in my heart.
O you that I loved!
O you that I loved!
The red sun is caught on the mountain ridge.
A herd of deer cry sorrowfully.
On the mountain where it stops, about to fall,
I call out your name.
In grief overwhelming I call.
In grief overwhelming I call.
Though my cry goes bending away,
the space between sky and earth is too vast.
Even turned to stone where I stand on this spot,
O name that I will die calling!
O you that I loved!
O you that I loved!
I’m glad we got a happy ending for TE and LG in TKEM, but when I read this poem it makes me think of TE. I see it being her poem, in the way she was willing to give up life and love for the better good, despite knowing the enormous cost.
@Welmaris, I wrote this piece back in April, when TKEM had just started airing. I was not inspired by the drama, although I did try to write music that could be part of an imaginary drama. Now that I look back, the mood of the piece fits the poem perfectly. Writing music for dramas is my new dream job!
@snow flower, this is hauntingly beautiful! Thanks so much for sharing this with us!
Here is a new piece inspired by “The King: Monarch of Eternity.”
Thank you @Welmaris for for prompting me to compose a special piece for Lady Maximus!
@Snowflower, I can imagine Maximus tossing her mane in pride at hearing this beautiful, spirited piece! Better than organic carrots!
Thank you! Glad you found it!
Thanks for another original composition, @ Snow Flower. This was fun.
I can imagine Lady Maximus doing the piaffe and passage with this one. Hopefully she doesn’t unseat Tae Eul. 🙂
@Snow Flower, this is just perfect for our Maximus (still can’t imagine her as a lady 😝). Throughout the composition I could close my eyes and imagine the white maned Maximus galloping through a forest with Lee Gon in all their glory! 💗
Great composition here :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9anRpgE-ps
Look like difficult to play.
And this one too is great :
Thank you for listening!
Since Maximus is a lady, the piece uses the tempo and the rhythm of the minuet, a court dance from France, popular in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The right hand plays the fanfare, while the left hand prances with dignity.
Aah I see..yes it’s got that tempo of a court dance..💗
Thanks @Snow Flower. I enjoyed it, so stately and appropriate for our Lady. It definitely has your touch and your style. As usual I get inspired to return to the Sound Cloud and listen to your other compositions. Am enjoying them now. (*⌒▽⌒*)θ～♪
@WEnchanteur, I did not see your comment until today. Thank you for listening. The Crumpled Paper piece is inspired by Chuno. If you have seen the drama, you will know which character it depicts.
I have 16 piano pieces so far, all inspired by Korean dramas.