OPTION 2025: DoYeon Kim

Recorded in the ESS garden on August 10, 2025.

DoYeon Kim performs “Silk Echoes Beneath the Light,” an improvisational work that explores the intricate resonance of the 12-string gayageum, weaving through light and space. The performance illuminates the complex interplay between novelty and familiarity, silence and sound, tradition and innovation, where traditional Korean music, contemporary composition, and spontaneous expression converge.

The gayageum’s silk strings invite a tactile experience—each note resonates like a living entity, shifting and entangling like silk touched by light, revealing a spectrum of hues and textures. The performance emphasizes the delicate details felt through the fingertips and the profound resonance of silk, guiding the audience to experience this deep sonic landscape together.

About DoYeon Kim

DoYeon Kim is an internationally acclaimed artist known for her uniquely broad and deep musical approach. Traditionally trained on the gayageum (an ancient Korean zither), her work synthesizes Korean, jazz and improvisation idioms, and she is regarded worldwide for introducing the gayageum into contemporary music. Recognized as one of 7 Musicians Pushing Ancient Asian Instruments Into The Future (Grammy.com, 2021), she has received the Van Lier Fellowship (2023) and been nominated for a Korean Grammy Award (crossover category, 2018). Most recently, she was selected as a Next Jazz Legacy awardee (2025), further solidifying her presence in the contemporary jazz scene.

The OPTION series is curated by Andrew Clinkman, Lily Finnegan, and Dorothy Carlos.