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Category Archives: Dano 2007

Dano Festival - Trafalgar Square

08-May-08

The scheduled Dano Festival 2008 in Trafalgar Square is one month away: Sunday 8 June.

To whet the appetite, here’s the official video (10 minutes) from last year’s event:

Some spectacular photos from Dano 2007

06-Jul-07

Dano Totem pole - photo by Samuel ChoI just got an email from Samuel Cho telling me about the photos he took at the Trafalgar Square Dano festival a couple of weeks ago. His site is well worth a visit. Some great photos of the b-boys and the taekwondo display, as well as some colourful pics of the procession. And of a totem pole (right). It’s good to get another viewpoint.

Links:

More pictures from the Dano festival

23-Jun-07

Dano sparkling logo - by Mark Ak

Many thanks to Katie, Mark and Sung-min for letting me use their pictures of the Dano festival last Sunday. Mark has uploaded a full set of his photos over at the Korean Language Meetup site. Go visit the gallery - there are some other good photos over there too. I’ll also be asking people to send in photos of the Kingston Korean Festival on 30 June as well, so make sure you all take your digital cameras down to the Fairfield recreation ground next Saturday.

First, some of Katie’s pics:

photo by Katie

photo by Katiephoto by Katiephoto by Katie

She also took the photo of the b-boy in Monday’s post. Next, here’s a sample of Mark’s photos. Remember it was also the day of the parade commemorating 25 years after the Falklands war:

Falklands Flypast - photo by Mark Ak

B-boy by Mark Ak Dano parade - by Mark AkDano chef - by Mark AkDano Samulnori - by Mark AkB-boy by Mark Ak

Mark also snapped the logo at the top of this post. And here are some more photos from Sung-min which didn’t really go with Jennifer’s post on Monday.

Dano festival - photo by Jeon Sung-min Dano festival - photo by Jeon Sung-minDano festival - photo by Jeon Sung-min

Thanks to all of you.

Links:

Please send in your Dano photos - particularly b-boy action shots

19-Jun-07

As you may have gathered, I didn’t make it to the Dano event in Trafalgar Square on Sunday. But it would be great to get a flavour of what it all looked like. Jennifer’s great post yesterday helped, but it would be fun if you could send in any photos you have. I’ll decorate yesterday’s post with them, or maybe have a separate post just for the photos. Full credit will be given to the photographers, or, if you’d rather remain anonymous I’ll respect that too.

Where to send them to? My domain name is londonkoreanlinks.net, and so if you just email your pics to philip at that address, it’ll get to me. If you get the chance, please shrink the image size so that the maximum dimension is 550 pixels (that will cut down on the amount of megabytes in my inbox). But no worries if you don’t know how to do that.

I look forward to seeing them.

Update 19 June 10pm. I’ve received photos from two people thus far. Many thanks. I’ve updated Jennifer’s post with Sung-min’s pictures, and will have a separate post for Katie’s. I’m hoping someone will have some action shots of the b-boys…

Rivers dance for Dano

18-Jun-07

A roving reporter’s account of yesterday’s Trafalgar Square Dano festivities
by Jennifer Barclay
with photos mostly by Jeon Sung-min (photo of the b-boys by Katie)

The Dano festival about to start in a grey Trafalgar Square

It was a grey day on Sunday 17 June; but I donned a slightly sparkling T-shirt and set out for Trafalgar Square for the first ‘Korea, Sparkling’ Dano festival to be held there. ‘Korea, Sparkling’ is the new brand to lure foreigners to Korea. Dano? A traditional Korean summer festival, where people from neighbouring villages came together to have fun and celebrate the spirit of community. It would be just as likely to rain in Korea too, but warmer. The dark clouds looked like they might just hold off. And the cute little kids waving flags provided enough sunshine.

Team Kroniculs demonstrate some TaekwondoBy two o’clock my mouth was burning nicely from eating delicious rice cakes in spicy, gloopy red sauce (comfort food, the Korean equivalent of baked beans) and my ears were assaulted by tinny pop music accompanying a taekwondo-inspired dance routine that no-one could see properly. Then the hosts on stage were teaching us all to shout ‘An-nyeong-haseyo!‘ The steps in front of the National Gallery were full of people, and the square was getting busier. It was already hard to get to the food stalls and the tourism stand where with flags and information they gave out questionnaires (’When you think of travelling to Korea, what comes to mind?’). It seemed a successful day so far, I said to one of the girls handing out programmes. She smiled nervously. ‘I hope so! Thank you for coming!’

I giggled at first when the hip-hop dancers or B-boys started their breakdancing routine on stage. How did hard-working, obedient Korean kids get into breakdancing? Though they wore their baggy clothes and pulled-down hats convincingly. ‘Rivers’, the team of five from Seoul, were pitting their manoeuvres against Irish champs Bad Taste Cru. At first to my ignorant eyes it all seemed a lot of falling down and squirming crab-like on the floor, but then the acrobatic stuff started. When a young man balanced upside down on one single hand and then effortlessly flipped to the other hand and his t-shirt slipped down revealing a torso of pure rippling muscle, I realised how this stuff could catch on. Oops, someone somersaulted off the stage by mistake. But nobody hurt.

B-boy belly - by Katie

I’m a big fan of samulnori and the foursome up next with two drums and two gongs showed amazing stamina as they keep perfect timing, unfaltering, through crescendo, ebbing away then building again. It got my hips moving. They smiled throughout, making it seem easy as their hands just kept going and going.

An older British man in deep green uniform and beret was the most colourful, medal-bedecked of the veterans wandering around, so I had to talk to him. He’d been marching earlier to lay wreaths at the cenotaph for the Queen’s official birthday, and decided to see the Korean festival. He served with the Royal Ulster Rifles in the Korean War and showed me old photos. ‘We arrived in Korea in October 1950, and advanced as far as Pyongyang before the Chinese came over the border.’ They had ‘an engagement’ with the Chinese and were ambushed the following night; 208 killed, wounded or taken prisoner, including his friend. That winter the wind-chill made the temperature feel like 40 below — not so easy for digging slit trenches, and it took a while for their winter gear to arrive. A lovely old man, and hard to believe he was 83, Korean youthfulness must have rubbed off on him. I asked what he thought of the entertainment. He smiled, ‘They do a lot of that drumming, don’t they?’ It always throws him off when he’s marching at the annual Kingston event. We shook hands and said kamsahamnida.

Pajeon in Trafalgar Square

It being Father’s Day, the hosts on stage taught London to say Ap-pa, ssarang-hae! (Daddy, I love you.) I noticed a lot of English-looking men with Korean wives, mixed kids. I also noticed a happy multicultural mix: African ladies in bright print dresses, Muslim ladies covered up, Indian families, Eastern European accents. Lion danceI asked a couple of English girls what brought them here. ‘A Thai friend told me about it, she knows I’m into martial arts, but I missed that bit.’ What else had they enjoyed? ‘I like the dancing, the music. I tried some noodles, they’re nice.’

We watched an entertaining lion mask dance, two people in each lion costume shaking its white tassels to the drumming, and a funny masked lion tamer. Then hundreds of cameras were raised in the air to capture the very slow, formal and beautiful fan dance. When all the women span round, their pink silk dresses billowed out, flowing like water.

Fan Dance

Who’d have thought I’d watch two breakdancing contests in one day? But again it was mesmerising, exhilarating, and after gorging on chap-chae noodles and pa-jeon pancake it was galling to watch these boys looking light as a feather, balancing their whole bodies on one hand, somersaulting in the air, then spinning on an elbow. When it ended, I said hello to a group of young people who looked like they were from London. I asked a black guy from Hackney what he thought of the breakdancing. ‘Be honest!’ his mate said, grinning. It turned out I’d found quite an expert, as Shane had seen his heroes, Extreme Crew, in Seoul, and they were hard to beat. What was a Hackney boy doing in Seoul? ‘It was for the world tournament of an arcade game based on dancing, Pump It Up NX. It’s a worldwide thing. I’ve been playing for many, many years.’ He was 22, had been playing for seven. So, who did he think had won the contest today? ‘Rivers,’ he said, without having to think about it. ‘They were more cleaner, impactful, more fresh, they had more variety. Their team moves were more cleaner.’

Samulnori

There was more from the samulnori; only this time they were also dancing, with those long white ribbons attached to the drummer’s hat, so he can make fast-swooping patterns in the air as he drums faster and faster. The leader did something that looked suspiciously like break-dancing. It was at the end of the final parade of all the performers that Korean Wave met Korean traditional. As the samulnori drums beat away, each of the Rivers B-boys came into the ring solo and showed moves that dazzled the crowd. When everyone had taken their final bows and the last kamsahamnida had been shouted, there was no doubt who the absolute stars of the show were. Rivers posed like a boy band in hooded tops, first with their backs to the crowd and then turning around to smile at their camera-toting fans.

I never found any of the ‘iris hair treatments’ or ssirum wrestling traditionally part of Dano, or the Dano fan-making that the literature had seemed to promise. Perhaps I was just too distracted by everything else. But the point of ‘Korea, Sparkling’ is to show emotional dynamism, vitality, enthusiasm and openness to diversity. Korea sparkled for Dano in London, and London sparkled back.

Final farewells

Links:

  • More pictures can be found here

Some videos to persuade you to come to Trafalgar Square on Sunday

14-Jun-07

Korean open-air Dano (early summer) Festival, Trafalgar Square, Sunday 17 June, 12-6pm

First, here’s Team Kroniculs, aka the Jaguar Demo, who will be participating in the Taekwondo display. It’s not just martial arts they do:

Next, here’s the Korean b-boy crew Rivers:

They’ll be battling against the UK’s Bad Taste Cru. Here’s b-boyTime:

There will be some Samulnori percussion (though not the group illustrated here):

and a traditional Korean fan dance like this:

and a Korean sword dance, which might look something like this:

The things you can find on YouTube nowadays…

For a full listing of the events on Sunday 17 June in Trafalgar Square, celebrating the Dano Festival, click on the link below. Thanks to Asiana Airlines for generously providing some of the funding.

Links:

From Fan dance to Breakdance for Dano festival

27-May-07

Rivers crewFor those who missed the Korean breakdancers when they came to London earlier this year, the Rivers crew from Korea (left) will be battling it out with the Bad Taste Cru from the UK in Trafalgar Square on June 17.

It’s all part of a unique event to celebrate Dano, the Korean early summer festival. Over thirty musicians and performers will be coming over from Korea to take part in DANO, Korea Sparkling Summer Festival 2007. It’s the first time that a Korean cultural event has been held in such a high profile location. Apart from the B-boys, most of the visitors from Korea will be from the Yeongsan company of traditional arts.

There will be food stalls, craft demonstrations and all sorts of fun and frolics. Come along and enjoy the summer. The outline timings are set out below; visit the Korean Cultural Promotion Agency website for further details.

Update 14 June 2007. I just discovered that there may be some last-minute changes to the order of events. The below, and the version on the KCPA’s website linked above as of today, may not be the final running order. The definitive programme should be up on the KCPA’s website by close of play Friday 15th June. I might not have a chance to update this post. So for the right details you should check the KCPA website for the exact timings before you set off if you particularly want to see one of the events.
Dano swing

12:00~ Site Open
12:30~13:00 The Grand Parade
13:00~13:30 Opening Ceremony & Launching event of Korea Sparkling
13:30~13:50 UK-Korean B Boys Battle
13:50~14:10 Taekwondo (Korean martial art)
14:10~14:25 SamulNori (Korean traditional music)
14:25~14:37 Minyo (Korean traditional music)
14:37~14:43 Janggochum (Korean traditional dance)
14:43~14:53 Lion Mask Dance (Korean traditional dance)
14:53~15:00 Fan dance (Korean traditional dance)
15:00~15:30 The Grand Parade
15:30~15:40 Sword Dance (Korean traditional dance)
15:40~16:00 Korean Traditional Wind Ensemble (Korean traditional music)
16:00~16:10 Lion Mask Dance (Korean traditional dance)
16:10~16:20 Fan Dance (Korean traditional dance)
16:20~16:40 UK-Korean B Boys - Free Style
16:40~17:00 Pungmul Daejanchi (Korean traditional music & dance)
18:00 Event Ends

Links:

  • Read an account of the proceedings here
  • More photos here