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Korean music is quite rich and popular in Asia. The music of Korea has greatly influenced by Chinese music but in spite of that it has managed to maintain its distinctive flavor and uniqueness.
Two major types of Korean songs are sog-ak and chong-ak. The unique aspect about these two types of music is class accorded to these two. While the former one is for masses whereas Chong-ak represents the set of Korean songs for the ruling class. Apart from these, there are several subcategories of music in the country.
Korean music places special emphasis on delicate usage of instruments. Let’s have a more detailed look at categories of instruments used in Korean music.
There are three categories, percussion, string and wind instruments.
Percussion instruments are, janggu that is a hourglass drum, the bak,i.e, clapper, kkwaenggwari (hand held gong), jing, i.e., large hanging gong, buk also known as barrel drum, chuk, i.e., square wooden box with mallet and pyeongyeong (stone chimes).
String instruments include haegum (two-string vertical fiddle), 12-string zither (gayageum), ajaeng (seven-string zither) and geomungo (six-string plucked zither). Last in the category are wind instruments.
Major wind instruments are, piri (cylindrical oboe), panpipes, daegeum (large transverse flute), dandos (small notch vertical flute), Chinese oboe, hun, saenghwang (mouth organ) and grass flute.
The most sophisticated genre of Korean music is p’ungnyu. This word also denotes music. Interestingly, Korean music is segregated into types like aristocratic, courtly, religious and scholarly. Folk music is also quite admired in the country. The music is mostly melodious and works on jangdan which is a set of rhythms.
Types of court music are Dang-ak, Aak and Hyang-ak. However, court music is almost going extinct. Korean classical music is very much similar to Chinese classical music. Korean music is greatly influenced by Buddhist culture.
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