조선신궁 예제(例祭)와 조선 아악

Abstract

This article examined the music and dance performed at the annual ancestral rite held at the Joseon Shrine. The yearly ancestral ritual of the Joseon Shrine began on the October 17 in 1925. The service was not just a shrine event, but also a state-level ritual, managed by the Government-General of Korea, which worked closely with the Music Department of the Imperial Household Agency of Japan, in order to establish the music to be used in the ritual. The music performed during the ancestral rite was Japanese kagura and togaku, which played a role as background music. Since the beginning of the ritual, music and dance that was dedicated to Japanese God were performed in different occasions. Kagura dance was first performed in 1934, and aak by Yiwangjik-aakbu began to be played at Joseon Shrine in 1926, eight years earlier than the kagura performance. Each year, six to eight aak pieces were played at the Shrine. 37aak were performed in total, while 7 pieces of ritual music and 30 pieces of banquet music were practiced. In the early days, ritual music became the center of the performance, but as time passed by, the ratio of banquet music was increased and, by the 1940s, only banquet music was adopted. This indicates that the role of aak has gradually changed from music that has been dedicated to God to entertainment music for the general public. Aak was also used as an image to promote Japanese colonial policy. In front of the tower, which was built in 1939 at the Joseon Shrine, a statue of Yiwangjik-aakbu, playing the Japanese national anthem using Korean instruments, was placed with copper plates. This was an attempt to show that Joseon's royal culture was part of Japanese culture, and also to idealize the ideology of “Japan and Korea are one entity via music,” which Japanese court musicians had conceived since the 1920s. The music and dance played at the Joseon Shrine, which began with the intervention of the Government-General of Korea and the Music Department of the Imperial Household Agency, were performed in the same way, as the customs of mainland Japan, in that the both ritual music and music was dedicated to God. As the performance of aak was allowed for anyone to attend, the music that was played by Korean court musicians, served as a very effective means of gathering worshipers to the Joseon Shrine. Aak in the Joseon Shrine showed the ruling power of the Government-General of Korea, as well as the humiliation of the Joseon Dynasty. On the other hand, it played a part in expanding the scope of music that was enjoyed by the general public. The annual ancestral ritual music at the Joseon Shrine has an important meaning in the study of modern Korean music history in that, it not only shows the aspects of the appropriation of court music, but also the expansion of the music culture of that time.