Joyce Kwon, Dream of Home Review

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Joyce Kwon is a Korean-born, American-raised singer-songwriter, an accomplished multi-instrumentalist, classically trained composer and zither player based in Los Angeles. As a young child in America, Kwon struggled for acceptance, she was accepted to the arts high school in Los Angeles for classical piano, only to find out that her acceptance had been a clerical error. Kwon was told she had no business playing the piano, but with nowhere else to go, she was allowed to enroll as a voice major instead. This did not squelch her musical desire, Kwon’s spirit and love for music was still bright and burring with the desire of creating music. She delved into composition/improvisation and started learning to play gayageum, the traditional 12-string Korean zither. After High School, Kwon made the necessary move to New York City to be a jazz singer, which soon led to her returning to her birthplace of Seoul to continue her zither studies.

The result is, Kwon has one foot in the roots of jazz and black American folk music and one in Korean traditional music. Kwon’s original compositions are folk songs for those in between, folk music of folks of the diaspora: new-American folk. Kwon is now releasing her debut album. Recorded in Los Angeles, Dream of Home, is a passing down of stories as told by first- through fourth-generation Americans from Korea, Macau, Japan, Russia and beyond. Dream of Home reflects on Kwon’s memories of growing up Asian in America, and later returning to Korea as an adult and experiencing feelings of estrangement as an American in Asia. With eight tracks, Kwon will take you on a musical journey that is creative and deep in meaning, with surprises and musical treats.