For a moment, let us turn away from the pop-culture scene in Korea and look towards an unfortunate situation with a violin prodigy. Eugene Park is a well-known electric violinist known for his passionate and charismatic performances. He is U.S-born, and entered the highly prestigious Julliard School at the age of 8. Since then, he has been noted as one of the best violinists of the decade and even performed at the Super Bowl in the 1990s. He was invited to play at Michael Jackson's concert in Seoul, and even played for the Presidential Inauguration in 1999. In 1998, he went to Korea, where he was accepted as a national hero and the pride of Koreans. However, people have been noticing a dramatic change in his physical appearance and the quality of his performances recently. Korean fans found out that he has been exploited and abused by his agents in Korea, and even imprisoned for several years. The condition of Eugene Park, who suffers from bipolar disorder and light autism, worsened due to his agents forcing him to take drugs. There are rumors that the CEO of Eugene's management company has connections with the police and the mafia which explains why the police have not done anything to help the musical prodigy. In these next two videos, you see Eugene Park performing the same piece, "Tequila". The first video is a passionate performance from his first concert in Korea. video credits: lizgeier Here is the shocking video of his most recent performance of the same song. You can immediately notice his drastic weight loss as well as hear and see the change in his musical quality. video credits: songbyounghun This performance was supposedly right after the manager beat up Eugene Park and locked him up in a secluded room. Eugene Park's already unstable condition became steadily worse by the constant abuse. There are speculations that Park is slowly recovering and taking medication to help with his instability. Here is a video taken in either 2008 or 2009. Eugene Park was playing at a buffet... In this video, you can see his fake smile and his robot-like, emotionless playing. I have never gotten so angry and tearful from a 17 second video before. video credits: kokkkful As a cellist myself, watching Eugene Park's downfall is devastating. This definitely shows how manipulative some management companies are. We must help this fragile musical prodigy. Let us all help expose this situation. -EDIT- Here is another video where you clearly see the distrubed and mentally unstable Eugene Park. Although the person recording kept saying "It's a video", Eugene Park helplessly holds his "V" up like a little child unable to understand. video credits: mijuen Thank you JennyKim319 for the tip Source: Korean Beacon
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