Driven by the belief that music has the power to reunite with our feelings, our humanity, and each other, Westergaard has spent his four decade spanning career traveling the world in the pursuit of musical connection. With 18 records and two Danish Music Award nominations under his belt, ‘The Gori Project II’ is a deeper dive into the relationships formed through his previous South Korean collaboration, ‘The Gori Project’.

The word ‘Gori’ translates to ‘connection’ from Korean, and offers an insight into the meaning behind the project. “I believe creativity in the arts and music will be a medium to understand each other. Many cultural and societal issues are caused by misconnection and lack of understanding.” says Hyelim Kim, who plays daegeum, a traditional Korean bamboo flute.

Warm synthesizer pads, rich percussive timbres of drums and bells, hypnotic basslines, and the mesmeric intertwining of Korean folk melodies provided by the daegeum (bamboo flute) and trumpet/flugelhorn come together to craft an intimateworld of meditative textures. Somewhere between composed and spontaneous, the music creates a space for the musicians and audience alike to participate in an egoless dialogue of ideas, sounds, feelings and traditions.

“The intention is to give the audience an experience of witnessing and becoming part of a space where cultures work alongside each other. Where there is a dialogue between differences. In this way, there is a message in The Gori Project II that this is how the world can also be.” – Torben Westergaard