Moon-Sook Park, associate professor in the Department of Music, has been honored as one of six awardees of the Korean-American University Professors Association Academic Excellence Award at the 2020 KAUPA Year-End Social on Dec. 15.

KAUPA awarded her in recognition of her co-authored two-volume work Korean Art Songs: An Anthology and Guide for Performance and Study, published by Classical Vocal Reprint in 2017. It is the first authoritative anthology of Korean Art Songs to be published in the United States. For 2020, KAUPA selected the best 28 members in the 12 categories of awards among over 4,000 members in the USA and Canada. 

Music critic and pianist Warren Jones wrote in his endorsement in 2017, "This new Korean Art Song Anthology is sure to be a most welcome addition to anyone's — teacher's, student's, or coach's — library, as it opens in a clear and vibrant way this wonderful song literature from the Korean nation and the Korean spirit. The essays on lyric Korean diction and the history of Korean Art Song are invaluable additions to our knowledge and our collections. Bravo to everyone concerned — a beautiful book, handsomely conceived and executed!"

Kathleen Roland-Silverstein, assistant editor for the Opera Journal, and music reviewer for the Journal of Singing, writes, "This two-volume collection is an unprecedented and welcome addition to the growing collection of nonstandard art song anthologies. The creators of Korean Art Song: An Anthology and Guide for Performance and Study have included the now requisite IPA translations, word-for-word English translations, Romanized text above the Korean text in the music, and a guide to the orthography and pronunciation of the language [...]. One of the beauties of art song is the opportunity it affords to connect cultures through poetry and music. By publishing and promoting gagok, or Korean art song, the creators [of this collection] have made possible a deeper understanding of a culture which, at the moment, looms large in our national consciousness, and which we can ill afford to ignore."

About KAUPA (Korean American University Professors Association): Established in 1986, KAUPA is a non-profit organization consisting of Korean-descendant professors in North America, with the common interest of promoting society's betterment through their talents and expertise. KAUPA plays significant roles in facilitating academic research and scholarly cooperation among the members, accommodating scholars' academic and social exchanges between North America and Korea, developing sponsor programs for its members, and awarding scholarships to Korean-American and Korean-Canadian students.