Korean-born composers who settled in Berlin, Isang Yun and Unsuk Chin’s music subverts simple categorization through the myriad ways that their identities, experiences and personal histories evolved. Chin’s Advice from a Caterpillar is a humorous solo movement from Alice in Wonderland. In 1967, Yun was kidnapped by Korean authorities in Berlin and threatened with a death sentence for espionage, eventually freed two years later after a worldwide petition signed by composers Stravinsky, Ligeti, Stockhausen and many others. His music embraces post-serial techniques with complex ornamental musical gestures found in Korean traditional music. Asked if Yun makes an effort to combine both Eastern and Western elements in his music, he replied, “I’m a man living today, and within me is the Asia of the past combined with the Europe of today. For that reason it’s impossible to categorize my music as either European or Asian. I am exactly in the middle. That’s my world and my independent entity.” Included in the program are other prominent German composers Fanny Mendelssohn and Johannes Brahms.

Unsuk Chin Advice from a Caterpillar for Bass clarinet
Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel Songs without Words
Isang Yun Sonatina Two Violins
Isang Yun Pezzo Fantasioso for Two melody instruments and bass
Johannes Brahms Piano Trio in C Minor, op. 101