The 23rd PyeongChang Great Mountains Music Festival opens July 23 across the Daegwallyeong area in PyeongChang, Gangwon Province. This year's theme is "Succession and Innovation." Leading performers from Korea and abroad, among them pianists Kim Dae-jin and Sunwoo Yekwon, will fill the mountain summer with music.
The two words pull at each other. Succession means taking up works long performed and finding new textures within them, and innovation means unsettling familiar instrumentations to make the audience's ears hear something unfamiliar. That a festival entering its twenty-third summer has raised both at once comes close to a declaration that it will keep what it has built without being confined by it.
July in Daegwallyeong is cool. When wind coming over the ridge brushes the branches of the larches, something like the sound of dry rain lingers for a long while. As the sun sinks, the smell of wet earth and the fog settle down into the valley. There is a reason people coming to an evening concert bring an outer layer.
Music entering a mountain village for one summer season is an event for the region as well. This area, where highland fields and pastures alternate one after another, has lived out its seasons divided between winter snow and summer escapes from the heat. The festival has made a season of its own in that gap for twenty-three years, and over that time the villagers and the performers have grown older together.
A tension follows a festival that has run a long time. The region wants to use the festival as a tourism resource, and the stage wants to keep the density of the art. The two do not always look at the same place. This year's theme reads as an expression that puts that misalignment out front rather than covering it up.
The opening date is July 23. The detailed schedule and ticketing information have yet to be released, so it is safer to check confirmed performance times before booking lodging and transport. Daegwallyeong sits at a considerable elevation, and evening temperatures drop sharply even at the height of summer.
Music heard in the mountains stays in the body differently from music heard indoors. When the performance ends and you step out the door, the wind and the sound of insects follow you at once. On the evening of July 23, it is worth setting out with the intention of taking in the air of Daegwallyeong as well.
Event Information
Date: Opens July 23, 2026
Venue: Daegwallyeong area, PyeongChang, Gangwon Province
