title

diorama

year of composition

2024/25

duration

11′

commissioned

by the korean national symphony orchestra

instrumentation

2(2=picc).2.2(2=bcl).2(2=cbsn)-4.2.2(2=btrb).1-timp-perc(3):vib／tbl／tam／crt／mar／elkbugle／rat／bd／slap／scym／btr／mtr-hp-pf(=cel)-str

performance

• june 13, 2025 | seoul, south korea

korean national symphony orchestra

seokwon hong · conductor

program note | jaebong rho, composer

In the fall of 2024, I had a chance meeting with someone who called himself a “truth seeker.” He was deeply into conspiracy theories, and what struck me was how firmly he believed something that was clearly false. That encounter stuck with me and made me think more deeply about the post-truth world we’re living in. What causes people to stop caring about what’s true? And where is this all heading?

What concerns me even more is that this isn’t just happening in the U.S.—it seems to be spreading quickly around the world, and it’s only accelerating. We don’t know how far it will go, but already it feels like everyone is living in their own kind of virtual reality—a sort of diorama. From a distance, it looks real. But when you look closer, the trees are plastic, and the water is just clear plastic sheets.

This piece reflects that process and includes a symbolic element: the elk bugle. It’s a hunting tool that mimics the sound of an elk to lure it in. In one section of the piece, other instruments begin to imitate this already-fake sound. That moment—when imitation spreads and the fake becomes collective—is at the heart of the work. The structure is clear, with each section unfolding in a way that lets the listener follow their own narrative and experience the collapse of the boundary between real and fake. In the end, diorama invites us to reflect on which version of reality we’ve chosen to live in.