Kpop Intro Essay

Seo Taeji and the boys introduced rap, rock and techno in the music. Ever since then, many other idols or young singers have been coming out with these types of songs. Kim Bum Soo was also the first singer from South Korea to get into the Billboard hot 100 chart and ranked 51st in 2001 (North East Cricket Forum). Ever since Kim Bum Soo entered the Billboard chart, many other singers and idols also started to enter the charts. Then soon after, Wonder Girls made it into the Billboard chart with the song ‘Nobody’. Also, many of the singers go abroad to perform, like Japan, China, Philippines, Paris, USA, etc.

Many of the singers are already performing in many other countries besides Korea. “Girls’ Generation signed with Interscope Records to release the group’s latest album in the United States last autumn and made its American television debut on David Letterman’s “Late Show” in January” (nytimes). Many others concerts were held in the US including SM Town New York, SM Town LA and the Google concert, which was held in San Francisco. Just to participate, all the singers that performed probably had many hours of training, but not all the singers in Korea came to perform. Only the popular singers performed.

In order to rank high in the charts, or get into the Billboard charts, the singers and idols had to get months or years of training. The singers also have to wait in order to get a call from these countries saying to come over. The idols have about 12-17 hours of training each day for over a few months to years. The smallest amount of training in Exo-K was Baekhyun with about a year of training (Ohkpop). Suho had the longest amount of training in Exo-K, with about 7 years (Ohkpop). Jo kwon also had about 7 years of training in order to debut into the group 2AM (Seoul beats).

However, IU only had about 10 months of training before debuting as a solo singer. “Trainees train almost nonstop for an average of two to five years before being allowed to debut. ” (Seoul beat) Trainees have to train a lot in order to debut and have to work hard or they get cut from the entertainment (Seoul beat). Entertainments usually train idols in order to perfect the skills. “The goal of the training period is to build up a potential K-pop group member’s stamina in terms of both singing and dancing. ” (Seoul beat) In Korean entertainments, training is a must and it is focused on mostly dancing and singing.

The idols train in order to perfect the synchronization. Many of the idols or singers were casted since elementary, junior high school or high school years. The more famous the singers are, the more money there is. “Up until the 3rd quarter of 2011, Girls’ Generation raked in a grand total of $19. 3 million USD. ” (allkpop) Girls Generation has even entered the billboard charts and have performed in Paris, USA, other parts of Asia, etc alongside DBSK, Shinee, F(x), Kangta, Super Junior, etc. “Over that same time frame (up until the 3rd quarter of 2011), Super Junior earned $12. 25 million USD, TVXQ earned $10. million USD, SHINee earned $5 million USD, and f(x) earned $3. 3 million USD. ” (Allkpop) These singers had many years of training and some of the members had different amount from the others, but got to debut in the same group as each other. Just because some of the trainees had more training than the other does not necessarily mean that they will be more popular. In an idol group called Beast, Junhyung makes the most money, yet another one of his members named Yoseob trained the longest out of all of them (Allkpop). Out of all the idols, G. Dragon from Big Bang makes the most money and IU is third yet she had only 10 months of training.

Jo Kwon from 2AM is in thirteenth place and yet he had about 7 years of training (Allkpop). Some of the idol groups, like Beast takes the money that was earned from personal work and split it equally with the members. “The boys guested on the latest episode of MBC TV‘s ‘Radio Star‘, where they revealed that their wages were split equally, regardless of who appeared on variety shows, dramas, or commercials. ” (allkpop). “However, Junhyung’s income from his composing and writing is exempt from this equal distribution because it’s his own work, a benefit of his creative license. ” (allkpop)

A lot of the singers were dropped from past entertainments like Hyunseong from Beast was in Yg entertainment. However, the staff dropped him at the last minute and went into Cube entertainment in order to train again and debut. “A trainee can be dropped by their company at any point in time if they are not good enough. ” (Seoul beat) However, many of the trainees get sent to other entertainment companies in order to train and debut, so their amount of time training gets even longer. Doojoon from Beast went from JYP entertainment to Cube entertainment and had to focus on dance in order to perfect it.