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Korean Kayagum Sanjo: a traditional instrumental genre

Casswell’s work on this co-authored book developed a Deleuzian approach to the analysis of the Korean folk music kayagŭm sanjo. Of particular importance in developing the philosophical approach that his research took is Deleuze’s (and Guattari’s) discussion of music in A Thousand Plateaus. Key concepts used were their notions of multiplicity and proliferation, which provided a context for the way in which sanjo incorporates a number of melodic strands, which are constantly re-articulated through metrical and temporal reorganization. These strands occur in the different ‘movements’ that make up a performance, which can last over an hour. Particular melodic types have related modal structures, which, in addition, make geographical reference to different parts of Korea. Thus the music cannot be defined according to abstract musical processes, and a purely musicological discussion of the work is not sufficient to uncover its complexity. Thus a particular aim of the project, and one that was Casswell’s primary focus, was to broaden the perspective of Korean music and place it within contemporary Western philosophical discussion.

Of importance in the development of his book was the cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary approach, whereby, Casswell as composer, exchanged understanding and ideas with the performer Chae suk Lee and ethnomusicologist, Keith Howard, to demonstrate how the study of a culture-specific topic can benefit from multidisciplinary insights. Such insights revealed that a wider frame of reference than the musical is needed to fully explore the context in which sanjo is located in contemporary society in South Korea. Casswell’s analysis of sanjo has been highly influential on his compositional research, which explores the way in which melodic strands and related harmonic process interact over the duration of a work.