Unbound Strings: Featuring DoYeon Kim & Firas Zreik

DoYeon Kim

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Show Description:

For her Uncharted performance, DoYeon Kim presents a project exploring how music can recover and reconnect us to emotions that often go unspoken in times of uncertainty and upheaval. Rooted in the depth of Korean musical tradition and shaped by her life in New York City, the work bridges cultural sensibilities and contemporary experience. Through the sound of the gayageum (Korean zither) and voice, Kim creates space for listeners to fully inhabit feelings of sadness, joy, anger, and peace—offering moments of reflection, resonance, and renewal.

The performance features DoYeon Kim (gayageum and vocals) alongside Tom Rainey (drums), Laura Cocks (flute), and Henry Fraser (bass), each contributing their distinct musical voice to the quartet’s expansive sound world.

Bio:

DoYeon Kim is an internationally acclaimed artist known for her expansive, pioneering performances and compositions, and for introducing the gayageum—an ancient Korean zither—into contemporary music. Trained extensively in jazz and improvisation as well as in the classical Korean traditions of sanjo, jeongak, and modern gugak, she channels history, literature, and an evolving sense of the human spirit into a musical language entirely her own through original works, powerful solo performances, and global collaborations. Named one of Grammy.com’s “7 Musicians Pushing Ancient Asian Instruments Into the Future” (2021), DoYeon has received the Van Lier Fellowship (2023), a Korean Grammy Award nomination (crossover category, 2018), and was most recently selected as a Next Jazz Legacy awardee (2025). After winning major traditional music competitions in Korea, including the Dong-A Ilbo Traditional Music and National Gugak Center Korean Music Competitions, she pursued contemporary improvisation and jazz studies at the New England Conservatory and the Berklee Global Jazz Institute, becoming the first student admitted to both programs to perform on a Korean traditional instrument. She has since served on the faculty at the New England Conservatory and The New School, lectured internationally at institutions including Harvard and the Franz Liszt Academy, and continues to lead her own projects while collaborating widely; recent roles include invited composer for Delirium Musicum (2025), Music Director of the ACCX Music Festival Gwangju (2025), and music director and conductor of the Gyeonggi Sinawi Orchestra (2023), alongside performances and recordings with artists such as Tyshawn Sorey, Kris Davis, Peter Evans, and many others.

Firas Zreik

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Show Description:

For his Uncharted performance, Firas Zreik combines his deep understanding of the Maqam tradition—the scale system found in Levantine, North African, and Mediterranean music—with elements of contemporary global musical styles encountered through a lifetime of travel and study. Centered on the kanun (Mediterranean harp), his work honors the tradition’s roots while expanding the instrument’s expressive range.

Bio:

Composer and kanunist Firas Zreik is a Palestine-born, New York–based artist who has performed and recorded internationally as a leader and sought-after collaborator since 2013. Known for redefining global perceptions of the kanun, Zreik honors the instrument’s roots in the Maqam tradition while expanding its expressive range across contemporary musical forms, viewing Maqam’s improvisation-driven legacy as a vessel for boundless creative exploration. His music is marked by emotional depth and a refined command of microtonal sound, moving fluidly between intricately orchestrated and spontaneous settings. Zreik has collaborated with a wide spectrum of artists, including Roger Waters, G.E. Smith, Residente, Simon Shaheen, Amir ElSaffar, Fabrizio Cassol, Shankar Mahadevan, Aynur Doğan, and Amal Murkus—his mother and frequent artistic partner, for whom he serves as musical director—and has brought his deeply expressive live performances to venues and festivals around the world.

Uncharted and the Elebash Artist Residency

Now in its 12th year, Uncharted is Greenwich House Music School’s annual concert series grounded in an artist-centered approach to supporting performing artists of color, female-identifying, immigrants, religious minorities, and members of the LGBTQIA+ community. These artists are central to New York City’s vitality and identity, yet they often face systemic barriers to sustained investment in career development. Uncharted aims to shift that dynamic. 

Tonight’s performances are the culmination of work developed during the Elebash Artist Residency, held at the School over the past several months. 

Learn more about Uncharted and the Elebash Artist Residency here.