The Secrets Behind K-pop’s Global
Success
K-pop
is an abbreviation of Korean pop, which is a unique musical genre, which
originated from South Korea. It is based
on audiovisual elements mixed of Western and European sounds with an Asian
flavor of performance that covers dance-pop, pop ballad, electronic, rock,
hip-hop, and R&B. Popularity of
K-pop has first started in East-Asia in late 1990s, and soon expanded to other
regions of the world such as Latin America, Middle East, Europe, and North
America among teenagers and young adult through Korean Wave, which refers to the global phenomenon of increasing
popularity of Korean popular culture.
Fashion
Fashion is one of the major significant
factors that influenced fans to love K-pop.
Clothes and
accessories worn by K-pop celebrities as well as their hairstyles and makeups
became popular among the teenagers and young adults. Often, particular fashion items or fashion
brands are sold out when K-pop artists wore or endorsed in public. Today, K-pop fashion industry became
the hottest platform for fashion marketing in Asia. Many famous designers choose K-pop artists for
product-placements, because it is the easiest and fastest way to expose their
new product to Asian fashion market.
Choreography
Dance is the vital part of K-pop. Usually, K-pop singers are consisted of
multiple singers. Therefore, singers
often switch their positions while singing by making swift movements, which is
called ‘formation changing’ and it became the basis of K-pop choreography. The K-pop choreography often includes
signature dance move to the song called, ‘point dance.’ It refers to a dance made up of hooking and
repetitive movements within the choreography that matches the characteristic of
the lyrics. The key of this strategy is
to make the movements stand out and to be easily remembered by people. Psy’s horse dance from his global hit
“Gangnam Style” is one of the good examples of a point dance. K-pop dance is
unique, unlike any other dances in the world. Its synchronized, catchy, and powerful group
dance, which immediately attract attention of people. Because of its group basis dance move, many
fans and teenagers enjoy learning K-pop dance with their friends and making
cover dance videos of their favorite artist. There are countless of K-pop cover dance
videos on YouTube from all around the world.
Unique Trainee System
There are top three entertainment agencies that dominates the K-pop industries, known as ‘Big Three.’ They are SM Entertainment, YG Entertainment, and JYP Entertainment. Korean entertainment agencies have very different system, which could not be found in any other countries. The companies actually create a process to train singers and dancers from young ages around 9 or 10. These trainees would tightly take dance and voice classes under supervision. Besides singing and dancing, trainees are also taught foreign languages, mostly English, Japanese and Chinese. The agencies act as guardian, manager, agent, publisher, producer and promoter, controlling every aspect of an idol’s career including record sales, concerts, publishing, endorsements, and TV appearances. And for these companies to train and launch their new artist, it costs them approximately $400,000. The K-pop entertainment agencies use three strategies to globalize the K-pop. First is exporting cultural products, such as placing Korean artist in different countries, second is creating international collaborations, and last is globalizing the product by cooperating with musicians from different countries to create a global.
There are top three entertainment agencies that dominates the K-pop industries, known as ‘Big Three.’ They are SM Entertainment, YG Entertainment, and JYP Entertainment. Korean entertainment agencies have very different system, which could not be found in any other countries. The companies actually create a process to train singers and dancers from young ages around 9 or 10. These trainees would tightly take dance and voice classes under supervision. Besides singing and dancing, trainees are also taught foreign languages, mostly English, Japanese and Chinese. The agencies act as guardian, manager, agent, publisher, producer and promoter, controlling every aspect of an idol’s career including record sales, concerts, publishing, endorsements, and TV appearances. And for these companies to train and launch their new artist, it costs them approximately $400,000. The K-pop entertainment agencies use three strategies to globalize the K-pop. First is exporting cultural products, such as placing Korean artist in different countries, second is creating international collaborations, and last is globalizing the product by cooperating with musicians from different countries to create a global.
