North Korea Goes Off the Deep End, Invites Clapton
If things couldn’t get more bizarre in the land of Kim Jong-Il, where the New York Philharmonic will perform Tuesday, becoming the largest American delegation ever to gain entrance into the backwards nation, things have gotten even kookier. The Financial Times reported that the North Korean government (I use the term “government” loosely) has invited Eric Clapton to come and perform next year, which would signify the first Western rock act to grace the DPRK. According to the Financial Times:
Mr Clapton had agreed ”in principle” to the idea, suggesting 2009 for the concert, the official said. Mr Clapton’s agent did not return calls asking for comment…A performance by Mr Clapton would be notable because, while classical music is well known in North Korea, rock and pop are banned because of their strong western influences.
I mean, if the Philharmonic wasn’t unprecedented enough, the guy who sings “Cocaine” and “I Shot the Sheriff” will entertain Pyongyang, a place that has been completely sheltered from popular music. And when I say completely sheltered, I mean it. There is no broadband internet in North Korea, no cell phones (they were banned in 2004), and only 4 television stations. Sadly, VH1 Classic is not one of them. Eric Clapton will look and sound like a space invader to the North Koreans.
And I wonder, as I wondered when “Slowhand” played his first show on Chinese soil in January, 2006, does Communist Asia see Eric Clapton as the personification of Western music? It must. I suppose the Rolling Stones, who made it to China 7 months earlier than Clapton, weren’t available to play in Pyongyang? Or Paul McCartney? Or Madonna?
Meanwhile, the New York Philharmonic, in Pyongyang this week, represents the groundbreaking instance of “Nixon diplomacy” that occurred in Beijing in 1971, when the U.S. table tennis team visited Mao’s China. As the New York Times pointed out in a story Monday, while such an exchange with the Americans might be a first for Pyongyang, Americans have a long history using orchestral diplomacy with other stigmatized nations. The Philadelphia Orchestra played mainland China in 1973, the Boston Symphony’s performed in the Soviet Union in 1956 and the New York Philharmonic did the Soviet Union in 1959.
As earth-shattering as these performances might have been in their time, or even the New York Philharmonic today, they will pale in comparison to that moment next year when Clapton strums his first chord on a North Korean stage.