Volume 3 / Chapter 96
TL: LightNovelCafe
After Jun Hyuk and Yoon Jung Su had left, Jo Hyung Joong recalled something he had completely forgotten.
‘How could I have not sent that yet.’
Jo Hyung Joong listened to the sound and voice a few times and picked up his phone.
“Professor, this is Jo Hyung Joong. Have you been well?”
“Oh, Teacher Kim. Yeah, and you?”
“I’ve been doing well thanks to you.”
Professor Ju Yong Tae, the 1st choice as a speaker for midnight programs introducing classical music, was talking to Jo Hyung Joong for the first time in a while. His fate with Jo Hyung Joong they participated in a forum program about popular and classical music.
Thanks to Jo Hyung Joong’s introductions, he often received requests to write classical OSTs for soap operas. This brought him a fair amount of money. He did have anticipation for Jo Hyung Joong’s call.
“So is something up?”
“Yes. I’m going to send you an e-mail. I’m sorry, I should have gone looking for you myself.”
“No, it’s okay. Aren’t you a busy person? What’s in the message?”
“There’s a song that someone I’m keeping my eye on wrote, and I was wondering if you would take a look at it.”
“Ho ho. What do I know about popular music? You’re more of an expert in that area.”
“It’s… not popular music, but a symphony.”
“Symphony?”
“Yes.”
Why is a classical composer sending a score to a popular music composer? Professor Ju became curious.
“Really? Who is it? It won’t be someone I know… Is it someone from abroad?”
If it were someone that Professor Ju knew, he would not have needed to go through Jo Hyung Joong. He would have just come to him directly.
“Ah… No. He’s a total rookie. That’s why I would like to get your definitive opinion.”
“A symphony for a total rookie? Ho ho. Sure. I’ll take a look and call you.”
Professor Ju turned his computer on and checked his e-mail. Four files were attached to the e-mail that Jo Hyung Joong sent. The file names concerto 1 to 4 stood out to him.
Professor downloaded all of the files and sent the 1st concerto to the printer first. Reading from printer paper was easier for his senile eyes than from a computer monitor.
The professor read through the score carefully and without looking at more than half of the first, he frowned and crumpled it, throwing it into the waste bin.
He coughed a few times to shake the unpleasant feeling and picked up his phone.
“Teacher Kim, it’s me.”
“Yes, Professor. Did you see it?”
“What in the world is this? Is this garbage what you call music these days?”
“Is… Is that so?”
Garbage. The most severe criticism that Professor Ju Yong Tae could say was garbage. It was to the point where students had to expect F grades if they heard the word garbage come from Professor Ju’s mouth.
“You call this music? It’s just uncomfortable noise. I don’t know who it is, but it seems like he’s just imitating contemporary music… Even listening to a little of it is uncomfortable. It isn’t music. It’s just a parody. This is made by a fake who just tries to look cool, thinking that he has a high standard and is philosophical.”
Garbage created by a fake who acts cool. This was Professor Ju’s final evaluation.
“Ah, I see. I’m sorry about this. I made you uncomfortable with an unnecessary request.”
Jo Hyung Joong quickly hung up the phone. Could it be that a young genius’ work is just play? This elder is one of the most famous classical composers and professors in Korea, and he is a renowned critic of classical music. If a man like that assessed someone’s music as garbage, there is a high probability that it does not have much value.
‘I bet. He’s only just 17 years old… For a beginner who hasn’t learned any composing techniques… a symphony is too much.’
Even so, there is no reason to be disappointed in the talent that Jun Hyuk had shown until now. The arrangement and composition he showed in popular music showed that he is plenty qualified to be called a hit maker.
Professor Ju Yong Tae poured criticism on Jo Hyung Joong, but the discomfort that the music left with him did not go away. He went outside because he thought that he at least needed fresh air to clear his mind. The professor took the full waste bin and went outside.
“Oh, Professor. Give that to me. I’ll empty it for you.”
“Ms. Mi Sun, thank you.”
The young Mi Sun, who works in the department office, emptied the full waste bin into the recycling bin.
Graduate school professor Um Ki Jun gathered the paper cups towering up on his desk with both hands and walked toward the recycling bin.
As he was turning around after throwing out the cups, the music scores caught his eye. They were scores that he would not have normally paid attention to. In a building with the school of music, scores are common garbage.
The scores caught his eye because they were on printer paper. Um Ki Jun always pushed his students to buy sheet music no matter what. If they get used to reading the sheet music downloaded from the internet, scores become unfamiliar to the eye.
Um Ki Jun took the scores. He thought that he would need to show them to his students the next day to nag at them. Curiosity also started forming.
He went back to his room and looked over the sheets, wondering what scores they were that they had been tossed in the garbage.
His eyes widened when he saw the first page because of the notes that appeared. A score difficult to find inside the school. Notes dancing irregularly. It is contemporary music. He had not yet seen a student who like contemporary music enough to print the scores.
Also, not just he the advisory professor, but most of the music professors hated contemporary music.
Um Ki Jun’s curiosity rose and he started reading the scores. Before he could even turn the first page, his head was already numb with surprise and the music filled the room as he turned the pages.
The music burned Um Ki Jun’s body like the neverending fire of hell. It felt like a goblin covered in sharp thorns was breaking his bones into pieces.
He put the score down a few times. It was too painful to withstand the pain. He put the score down several times and when he put it down for the last time, he even felt like his bones had become dust and his skin had been ripped apart.
“Ha….. Goodness…..”
This word came out without his knowing if it was a sigh or if it was in admiration. Whose work could it be? Since he started playing the piano in elementary school, he had listened to classical music for 20 years but this is the first time hearing such a shocking song. It seems like a 20th century song from its form, but he could not remember it no matter what.
How could he not know a work like this!
The last page of the score seemed to be speaking to Um Ki Jun.
The magic is not yet over.
You have to experience more of this pain.
Until your body becomes ashes, the flames will not go away.
The score told him that this is just the 1st concerto. How would the 2nd concerto be deployed and how would the finale be executed?
Um Ki Jun wanted to see more. He wanted to listen to more of it. Um Ki Jun ran to the dump again. He searched the area he had just picked up the score from, but could not find a single sheet.
There is no reason for the students to be looking at music like this… Could it be one of the professors? Or had someone written it themselves?
He did not even dream of going to ask the professors. Old people worshipping classicism and romanticism. They are just antiquated elders who do not go near contemporary music.
He could already see how these old people who even thought Stravinsky’s music to be bizarre would react to this score. This place is full of closed people who worship Beethoven and Bach.
Then could it be that one of the students found this while surfing the internet?
Um Ki Jun wanted to know either the score’s owner or at least the person who printed it no matter what.