In the previous post, we talked about Korean traditional music, divided into court music and folk music. In this post, we’re going to look at the modern Korean traditional music that was influenced by those traditional music in two genres: trot and contemporary traditional music. Trot has been a Korean popular song that originated in the early 1900s, influenced by enka, a Japanese old-fashined pop song, and fox trot, one of the western dance songs, and is also heavily influenced by traditional Korean folk music. Contemporary traditional music is music made by mixing Korean traditional instruments and forms with Western musical forms and electronic instruments, and it is more artistic than popular, so it is better to say that it is a crossover between Korean traditional music and Western popular music. In this post, we’ll take a look at trot.
Trot is derived from enka, a Japanese popular song, and fox trot, a Western dance song, but it is not related to fox trot except that it is a two-beat song. In the 1920s, Japanese enka songs were translated and sung in Korea, and many songs were composed, from Lee Ae-ri-soo’s ‘Hwangseong Old Ruins’ to Ko Bok-soo’s ‘Tahyang’, and the form was fixed as a two-beat song in the minor fifth of the ‘Ra-Si-Do-Mi-Fa’. The emotional content of the trot’s lyrics at this time was mainly mournful, as the trot’s lyrics were mainly about conflicts with the world and others, with no possibility of resolution or reconciliation, and the trot’s lyrics were about self-despair and self-pity. However, in the early 1940s, a new form of trot using the major pentatonic scale of ‘Do-Re-mi-Sol-Ra’ appeared and began to coexist with the previous minor trot, which is believed to have been caused by the situational need to weaken the tragedy of the minor trot due to the Japanese occupation and the Korean War.
After Japan’s defeat in World War II in 1945 and Korea’s independence, the trot remained popular, but from the late 1950s onward, the popularity of the trot briefly waned due to the emergence of new forms of trot influenced by American popular music and the popularity of standard pop itself. However, the late 1960s saw a resurgence in popularity through the early 1970s, with the emergence of some of today’s most recognizable trot singers and songs, such as Namjin and Na Hoon-ah.
In the early 1970s, folk and rock music gained popularity, and the popularity of trot waned, but in 1975, as negative perceptions of folk and rock became stronger, such as problems related to cannabis, trot began to gain popularity again with the appearance of singers who led the third heyday of trot, such as Jo Yong-pil. At the same time, trot also began to appear in a new form, mixing with forms of American popular music other than traditional trot.
In the 1980s, the term “Ppong-Jjak” was used to derogatorily refer to trot, and its popularity began to decline. In the 1990s, the genre of hip-hop and dance music became popular in South Korea, and the beginnings of the genre we now call K-pop began to emerge, with hip-hop dancers Seo Taiji and Children, gaining national fame, and trot culture was buried along with the perception that it was outdated.
The popularity of trot, which seemed to never return, has recently soared with the emergence of a competition program for young and talented trot singers called ‘Ms. Trot’ and ‘Mr. Trot’, and new forms of trot songs are being written and sung again, and a considerable number of trot fans have been created. However, there is a strong negative view of the genre among teens and 20-somethings, and its influence has not yet reached them.
The genre of trot is categorized as a mixture of different musical forms, starting with traditional trot, which is where it all started.
Traditional trot is the origin of trot songs that were composed under the influence of Japanese enka, such as the above-mentioned “Hwangseong Old Ruins” by Lee Ae-ri-soo. In addition, trots that use the pentatonic scale, which was a musical characteristic of early trots, are called orthodox trots and are sometimes referred to as dorodo.
Elegy trots, as the name suggests, are trots that emphasize elegy, often with sad lyrics and sad melodies, which are usually written in a minor key.
Blues trot is a genre that combines the blues, a genre of jazz music, with trot and is often titled “00 blues”. It usually uses the blues scale and the blues rhythm of 12/8.
There are also trots that are mixed with traditional Korean music, called Gukak trot. It’s usually a mixture of Minyo’s form and trot characteristics.
Ballad trot is a mixture of folk music and ballads that was popular from the 1970s to the 1980s and has a slower, more lyrical style.
R&B trot is a genre that combines R&B and trot, and there is also rock trot, which is a mix of rock and trot. Rock trot is a genre that appeared in Korea in the 1970s and combines rock elements such as drums and guitar riffs with trot.
Folk trot is a genre that combines folk music and trot, and after the decline of trot in the 1990s, it originated in live cafes where folk song singers from the 70s and 80s drank alcohol while singing.
Dance trot is a trot format that combines EDM with trot, and is also called semi-trot because it has the feel of trot but lacks most of the typical characteristics of trot. Currently, most of the trot that young people in their 20s and 30s in Korea know is dance trot, and this is because trot was declining at that time, and songs with less trot-like atmosphere were preferred and sung and heard a lot. In fact, there is not a single element that is shared with traditional trot except for the trot’s phrasing, and the phrasing or the feeling of the trot was called ‘Ppong’ at that time.
The origin of the word “Ppong” comes from the word “Ppong-Jjak”, which was a derogatory term for trot, but it didn’t actually refer to all trot, but to a genre of hardcore techno and synthpop mixed with trot. It’s also called electronic organ because it’s played by stacking a bunch of synthesizers like an organ. In fact, it has a different feel from hardcore techno, but it was called so because the BPM of the basic song was very fast, and the fast rhythm that was repeated sounded like ‘Ppong-Jjak Ppong-Jjak,’ and it was called ‘Ppong-Jjak’ and gradually became a derogatory term because this type of song was often heard in old commercial areas such as highway rest areas and old markets. Currently, the Korean trot industry tends to view the genre in a very demeaning way, centered around Tae Jin Ah, one of the singers who brought back the popularity of authentic trot in the 1960s, and musicians like me who are concerned about the development of traditional music see it in a very negative light. In fact, ‘250’, a composer who has written songs for a very famous K-pop idol group in Korea called NewJeans and has had a lot of hits in K-pop, released an album called “Ppong” in 2022, which is a very good example of a reinterpretation and development of this Ppong-Jjak trot, which is indirect evidence that we should take Ppong-Jjak trot seriously as a genre.
The final genre is the Pumba. Pumba is a genre that once again branched off from pomba and originated from the performance culture of traveling around the country’s marketplaces and playing while selling their wares. Their songs have a faster BPM than the pom-pom trot, and are characterized by sounding almost like they’re playing at double speed.
In conclusion, although there are those who criticize it because it originated from the Japanese popular song Enka and has many similar characteristics, my opinion is that it can now be considered one of the Korean musical forms through its own development in about 100 years. In addition, the trot itself is definitely an outdated music form, but there are many elements that we can develop anew, and if it continues to develop, it can definitely emerge as a new music genre in Korean popular music, not just K-pop.