During my time at Wesleyan, I’ve been a part of 2 ensembles, the Chinese music ensemble and the introductory Korean drumming ensemble. These are experiences that I could have never had without Wesleyan and the incredible resources the music department has in sponsoring programs that go beyond the borders of typical western cannon that you often find at colleges. In my Korean Drumming class we watched a video of an ensemble in Korea performing a piece each week and had the opportunity to ask our professor anything about the performance—these were invaluable lessons in Korean culture, all through music. We had access to an incredible wealth of information in Professor Kim and I learned an incredible amount about not just Korean music but the country’s wider traditional performative practices. I learned Korean numbers 1 through 10 because Professor Kim would make us count in beat during practices, saying that sounding out the unfamiliar syllables ourselves would help us get closer to the musical culture, and indeed I felt it did.
I didn’t fully realize the immense connection music had with my understanding and appreciation of culture until I had that first conversation with Satou san that one March afternoon on the other side of the world. It fundamentally changed an aspect of how I understood culture and cultural exchange.
Satou san loves American folk music and told me he was currently learning how to play the banjo. I don’t know any Americans who are currently learning the banjo, although I do hail from the state of New York (New Yorkers are not really known for their banjo playing), so I thought it was incredible. But he told me how difficult it was to learn, not because the instrument is difficult, but because finding an experienced banjo teacher in suburban Japan is nigh impossible. It’s simply not an instrument that is commonly played. It made me think back to a similar experience I had when I was learning the Erhu, a bowed string instrument I became interested in after playing it in the Chinese Music Ensemble at Wesleyan. Even in the metropolitan New York City, finding an experienced erhu teacher who could give lessons in English was incredibly tough.
It made me think about how musical experience and the kind of music one is exposed to is heavily influenced by the geographical location of their upbringing. In Japan it’s not uncommon for children to learn the koto, a Japanese zither, just as it’s not uncommon for them to learn piano or violin as many children in the (generalized) West do. The instruments that are “normal,” the sounds we find comforting, the sounds that act as stressors, are all highly variable and dependent on cultural upbringing. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it makes the sharing of music all the more valuable. Immersing oneself in another culture through music is a fantastic way to learn more about the nuances and intricacies of that culture. Musical tradition is, in my opinion, one of the purest forms of intercultural expression—for it has the ability to connect people regardless of the language they speak. There is a reason ‘music is a universal language’ is such a common phrase. This makes me truly appreciate places of higher education like Wesleyan that prioritize this cultural exchange and promote deeper understanding.
