Moranbong Band Plays for KPA Large Combined Unit #630

A Moranbong Band performance (Photos: KCTV screengrabs/NKLW file photo)

DPRK state media reported on 12 April (Friday) that the Moranbong Band gave a performance at a military unit subordinate to Korean People’s Army [KPA] Large Combined Unit(taeyonhap pudae) #630 on 11 April (Thursday).  The event was held to commemorate the one-year anniversary of Kim Jong Un’s (Kim Cho’ng-u’n) election as the Korean Workers’ Party’s [KWP] 1st Secretary and 1st Chairman of the National Defense Commission [NDC].  DPRK Cabinet Premier Pak Pong Ju, Director of the KPA General Political Department VMar Choe Ryong Hae, NDC Vice Chairman Jang Song Taek, KWP Secretary and head of the Kim Family Kim Kyong Hui, Minister of the People’s Armed Forces Gen. Kim Kyok Sik, KWP Secretary and Director of the United Front Department Kim Yang Gon, Deputy (vice) Director of the KWP Organization Guidance Department Hwang Pyong So, Col. Gen. Son Jol Chu, Lt. Gen. Ryom Chol Song, Col. Gen. Jon Chang Bok and Lt. Gen. Kim Jang Su traveled with the Moranbong Band to the forward deployed unit.  The members of the core elite and the Moranbong Band toured the unit’s historical exhibitions and viewed the honor roll of the unit’s heroes.  Prior to the performances, VMar Choe Ryong Hae delivered gifts to members of the unit, on behalf of Kim Jong Un.

Prior to the Moranbong Band’s performance, members of the unit welcomed the visiting VIPs with a performance of “reed flute pipe ensemble ‘Song of devoted protection of the leader sung by soldiers in the enemy rear'” and a martial arts demonstration.  The Moranbong Band gave its performance at the unit’s assembly hall for the unit’s officers, service members and their family members.  The Moranbong Band was “enthusiastically welcomed them with great excitement and loud applause.”  Before the concert, an unnamed presented “told the audience that Kim Jong Un sent the band to encourage the service personnel of the combined unit, which he loves more than any others, always thinking of it though very busy making preparations for a final battle with enemies to defend the country and its people at a time when huge aggressor forces are staging maneuvers for a war of aggression even in the sky, land and seas very near the forefront of the country with their destructive weapons involved, pushing the situation to the brink of a war” and she “expressed belief that the service personnel of the unit would creditably perform their mission as first-line human bullets and bombs devotedly protecting the leader and members of a death-defying corps and a scouting party for national reunification, bearing deep in mind the profound trust reposed by the Supreme Commander in them by making sure that the Moranbong Band gave its first frontline performance at the unit,” according to KCNA.

A Moranbong Band performance (Photos: KCTV screengrabs/NKLW file photos)

KCNA reported among the songs performed by the Moranbong Band were “‘Look at Us’, female trio ‘When the Night Wears on in This Land’, light music ‘The Country Will Always Remember You’ and ‘Advance and Advance’, light music and song ‘Our March’ and finale ‘People Have Single Mind.'”  The “performers sang high praises of the immortal exploits Marshal Kim Jong Un has performed by successfully weathering the stern trial of history with his firm faith and will to keep to the road of independence, Military-First politics (So’ngun) and socialism paved by the great Generalissimos.”  After the concert members of the military unit “mounted the stage and said with great excitement that the respected Supreme Commander’s dispatch of the Moranbong Band to their unit was a manifestation of his deep trust in the service personnel of the unit and the greatest privilege granted by him to them.”  According to KCNA they “full of confidence that when the time comes for a final decisive battle, they would storm into the strongholds of the enemies at a lightning speed and deal successive deadly blows at their headquarters and mercilessly blow up all the disgusting military installations and puppet reactionary ruling institutions.”

According to KCNA “the audience repeatedly broke out into shouts of slogans including ‘Let’s defend with our very lives the Party Central Committee headed by the great Comrade Kim Jong Un!'”  Members of the Moranbong Band “promised them that they would wait for the soldiers after setting up a stage for performance celebrating the victory in the war on the debris of the enemies’ strongholds” and departed from the unit with a “warm send-off of the service personnel and their families.”