According to Korea Tourism Organization, Yeongdong was the home of a man named Park Yeon who was responsible for creating Korean traditional music hundreds of years ago. Over the last 42 years, people have gathered in Yeongdong to celebrate the man and the music.
Only after traveling to Yeongdong, I learned that Yeondgong is Korea's largest fruit-producing area, and the Yeongdong Grape Festival is held simultaneously with the Nangye Traditional Music Festival. So the entire time I walked around the festival grounds, the air was filled with the smell of ripe grapes which were being sold by street vendors everywhere.
Being interested in Korean traditional music and dance performances, I eagerly anticipated this event. However, the event did not live up to its title as a ‘traditional music festival'. For the most part, the grape festival and its related activities made up the bulk of things to do.
I found two stages for performances. One stage was small and placed up on a hillside. The seating for this stage was simply a handful of picnic tables with an umbrella situated in front of a large fountain. There were no other options for sitting during the shows and no relief from the sun.
For a festival in its 42nd year and calling itself a traditional music festival, I was disappointed with the caliber of entertainment I saw. Fortunately, there were a few music related activities. I found a drum class for kids, a drum making tent, and some music instruments on display.
Hoping to find some better entertainment, I checked with the information booth about the performances that were scheduled for the much larger stage situated in a field nearby. I was not happy with what I learned. It turned out that the main highlight of the evening was going to be a recording of a famous Korean sketch comedy show called "Gag Concert" which would be difficult for me to understand or enjoy.
I persisted in my search for some decent entertainment, and I'm happy to say I found my way to a local temple to catch a ‘temple music' performance that was a part of the festivities. It started out strong when a women wearing an exotic robe performed a dance. However, the end left me wondering ‘why?' when the last song played was an old Frank Sinatra song.
Realizing that this festival was about grapes and pop culture more than traditional music performances, I decided to take the last bus home before the "Gag Concert" show started.
Sitting at my desk and looking back, I cannot recommend this festival to anyone but avid lovers of grapes because this not a strong example of a music festival, but rathaer a festival where you can buy fresh grapes and food products made from grapes, view grapes entered in a grape growing competition, and if you can figure out the event schedule, you can even step on grapes in a big tub with others. I admit, stepping on grapes does have some appeal, but I'll leave that for others to do.
