University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Department of Music Professor Emeritus Byong Won Lee was honored with a Republic of Korea Presidential Medal Award. Lee was selected for the award among seven nominees this year in the field of Korean music. The award recognizes excellence in research and scholarship and contribution to the Republic of Korea’s cultural organizations and the academic community.
“I’ve found that both Korean and Hawaiian cultures share a deep reverence for their musical traditions, and it has been my life’s privilege to help bridge cultural understanding through music at the University of Hawaiʻi,” Lee said. “The spirit of Korean music, like the spirit of aloha, transcends boundaries and brings people together, reminding us that we can preserve our cultural heritage while building connections across the Pacific.”
Lee has been a pioneer in Korean ethnomusicology. In 1960, the second year after the establishment of the Department of Korean Music at Seoul National University, Lee was accepted and majored in Korean music theory. In 1967, he was the first Korean student to enter an ethnomusicology graduate program in the West, embarking on his PhD at the University of Washington, which he completed in 1974 with a dissertation on Buddhist music in Korea.
In the same year he accepted a job at UH Mānoa in the ethnomusicology program, where he taught until his retirement in 2022. His scholarly publication endeavors extend from his major article on Korean music in the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (6th edition, 1980, 17 pages), much of which he prepared while still a doctoral student at the University of Washington, followed by numerous books and articles.
Lee succeeded in connecting the isolated Korean scholarly community of music specialists with major international organizations and assisted Western scholars with visits to Korea. He has played an important role in establishing and nurturing the status of Korean ethnomusicology as it has grown worldwide, with scholars specializing in various aspects of Korean music at numerous institutions now in the U.S., Europe, the Pacific and other parts of Asia.
The Department of Music is housed in UH Mānoa’s College of Arts, Languages & Letters.
