GRAY BY SILVER
Worldwide Excluding Korea
Winner of the 2026 Korean Music Awards — Best Global Contemporary Album
Gray by Silver is a four-member ensemble featuring piano, vocals, daegeum (Korean bamboo flute), and drums. Since 2016, the group has developed an original sound that blends the textural depth of contemporary art music, the improvisational language of jazz, and the universal resonance of traditional and ethnic music.
Like shadows that appear gray despite the countless colors that create them, the ensemble’s music exists at the intersection of genres—distilled, balanced, and distinctly their own. Their work moves fluidly from meditative stillness to explosive intensity, shaping expansive narratives through detailed composition and dynamic interplay.
Gray by Silver is a four-member ensemble featuring piano, vocals, daegeum (Korean bamboo flute), and drums. Since 2016, the group has developed an original sound that blends the textural depth of contemporary art music, the improvisational language of jazz, and the universal resonance of traditional and ethnic music.
Like shadows that appear gray despite the countless colors that create them, the ensemble’s music exists at the intersection of genres—distilled, balanced, and distinctly their own. Their work moves fluidly from meditative stillness to explosive intensity, shaping expansive narratives through detailed composition and dynamic interplay.
The group has gained international recognition for both their performances and compositions. They have appeared at major festivals including the Copenhagen Jazz Festival and Aarhus Jazz Festival in Denmark, the Tokyo Beyond Showcase Festival, and have been invited to perform at Guggenheim House in Kobe. In 2023, they performed at the Gong Stage of Colours of Ostrava and later at a special Korean music program at Lincoln Center in New York, where they received strong audience acclaim.
Their third album, Time of Tree, was inspired by the image of a withering plant resting on a piano and traces the quiet, cyclical rhythm of nature. Developed through field experiences across diverse ecosystems in Korea, the album translates these environments into sound and was awarded the 2026 Korean Music Award for Global Contemporary Album.
Rooted in Korean musical sensibilities yet reaching outward, Gray by Silver represents a distinctive and evolving voice within today’s global music landscape.
VIDEOS
CURRENT PROJECT
Time of Tree
Time of Tree is the third album by Gray by Silver, developed through immersive encounters with diverse natural environments across Korea. Rather than treating nature as a distant or abstract concept, the ensemble engaged directly with ecosystems — spending time within them and translating those experiences into sound.
At the core of the album is a reflection on nature as a self-organizing system, where all living things move according to their own rhythms within a vast interplay of chance and necessity. Cycles of growth and decay, life and death, and the quiet accumulation of time form the underlying current of the music.
Time of Tree
Time of Tree is the third album by Gray by Silver, developed through immersive encounters with diverse natural environments across Korea. Rather than treating nature as a distant or abstract concept, the ensemble engaged directly with ecosystems — spending time within them and translating those experiences into sound.
At the core of the album is a reflection on nature as a self-organizing system, where all living things move according to their own rhythms within a vast interplay of chance and necessity. Cycles of growth and decay, life and death, and the quiet accumulation of time form the underlying current of the music.
Blending composition and improvisation, the album unfolds with an organic flow — shifting between stillness and movement, tension and release. Each piece emerges as part of a larger continuum, where individual voices converge into a shared sonic landscape.
Rooted in Korean musical sensibilities yet open in form, Time of Tree offers a contemplative and immersive listening experience. The album received the 2026 Korean Music Award for Global Contemporary Album, further affirming the group’s distinctive artistic voice.