Last month the North Korean pianist Kim Cheol Woong gave two special performances in Washington, D.C. He first played at the State Department and then, near nightfall, in the dim, chandeliered rooms of the Polish Embassy. His purpose wasn’t to win laurels or make a name for himself. There weren’t even CDs for sale. Instead, as he told me with the help of a translator, his one aim is “to help make North Korea, where people live, a place where people can freely live.”

Kim’s brief U.S. tour, which began in New York and ended in Boston, follows on the heels of the New York Philharmonic’s joint concert with the State Symphony Orchestra in Pyongyang last February. While some criticize the concert as politically naive, Kim considers it a step forward. “The cultural approach in dealing with human rights is very important,” he told the embassy audience. “We were taught ‘American music is evil.’ In the past, this event would not even be imaginable.”