Overview 2018

The Sori Fantasy World Will Open like Magic!

The Jeonju International Sori Festival is a global music festival embracing various world music throughout the world with a special focus on Korean traditional music, including Pansori. This year, more joyful and colorful plans are ready to meet you from Wednesday, October 3rd to Sunday, October 7th at the Sori Arts Center of Jeollabuk Province and the 14 cities and counties of Jeollabuk Province.
It goes beyond genres, borders, and even generations! The main programs that we have planned are as follows: the super-sized double stage, where the passion and fantasies of eastern and western musicians will pour forth without stopping; the elegant ‘Five Batangs of Pansori’ and ‘Sanjo Nights,’ where the most famous master sori and instrumental artists of Korea gather in one place for your enjoyment; the ‘Sori Frontier’, the hottest competition strongly impacting ‘Korean-style world music’; and the performances and exhibition programs for children’s education and entertainment.
This year, we are going to introduce a series of gut, or Korean shaman music, throughout the festival, a style of music which has great cultural and artistic values while completely encapsulating its Korean tradition and going beyond simple shaman activities. This series can only be enjoyed here at the Sori Festival, through which you will be able to see how thoroughly we’ve planned for your enjoyment.
These pansori performances by young and middle-aged sori artists are famous, making it difficult to find tickets to their shows. As they provide subtitles and explanations, they are very popular among foreigners. They will put on great shows, in which the foreign audience members can completely understand the feeling of the authentic Korean artistic souls and history.
You can also feel a rather conspicuous and unique kind of passion, and new types of music, from musical groups that express their own souls and styles. The participating bands are Trio Reijseger Fraanje Sylla (from the Netherlands and Senegal); the Gipsy Pigs (the Pigswan Orchestra from France); the Meshk Ensemble (from Turkey); Kiwi & the Papaya Mangoes (from Japan); Naftule (from Spain); and Anders Hagberg (from Sweden). In addition, there will be speed meetings and workshops held, during which artists and professional festival planners cooperate and exchange their ideas. Also, artists from Korea and other countries will present moving performances for the audience through various collaborations. Sori is fantasy! This autumn, the fantastic world of sori will spread out before your eyes like magic.