As swaying hands held flash-lit phones in the air, The Music Academy stood witness to the crowd’s frenzy. On stage was not an indie fusion concert or a familiar face, but the annual edition of the Changwon K-pop World Festival, a weekend solely dedicated to K-pop, organised by the Consulate-General of the Republic of South Korea in Chennai in collaboration with Korea Foundation and the Korean Chamber of Commerce and Industry (South India).
A packed house welcomed the artistes, with generous servings of squeals and screams. A spectacle followed, with bands Chloris and Royal KD singing and dancing together with impeccable coordination, both to their own songs and to other popular K-drama theme songs. Videos featuring the crowd’s favourite artistes ran on the screens behind them. Veteran Korean singer Jung Jaewook further enlivened the evening with his soothing voice.
“This is the first time that we are hosting a K-pop event in Chennai. Usually we bring in traditional Korean folk performers for such events. This year, we noticed that there is a huge fan-following in Chennai for K-pop and so decided to host the festival,” said Shin Heejae, aide to the Consul-General of South Korea. Excited teenagers and young adults filled the hall and grew ecstatic as excerpts from their favourite Korean dramas started playing on the screen.
One of the highlights of the line-up was Jung Jaewook, who has been in the field for 20 years and is known for his deviant perception of K-pop and a leaning towards the ballad form of music, rather than the conventional K-pop style. Jaewook sang melancholic, romantic numbers like ‘Beautiful’, presenting fans with a sober performance — the focus being on the singing itself with little movement — unlike the rest who gave equal importance to singing and dancing.
When girl-band Chloris sang and grooved effortlessly to their original track, ‘Friday Night’, the crowd was all too keen to join in at the chorus. The relatively new band, with Dina, Mi Jin, Lee Won and Sun Woo, gained international recognition through Instagram and Youtube and were no strangers to the Indian audience. Being a rookie band, however, they said they have been lucky to gain popularity solely through social media which also makes it easier for them to communicate with people all over the world.
“The K-pop industry is very competitive, and there are a lot of bands coming up. But being a young band, we have not had many experiences where we felt it was too difficult, “ said Dina, the main vocalist of the group. The artistes, however, seemed quite unaware of their Indian fandom which, according to them, is significantly small compared to other countries.
The most popular band of the night was Royal KD. For the curtain raiser, one of the band’s rappers, Popsick, danced to a popular BTS song.
The three-year-old band was born out of the shared interest of four friends. “We were performing on a random street one day, just the four of us, and that’s when the agency spotted us. That’s how we entered the industry,” said Min-Uk-Song, also called ‘Main’. This boy-band has been receiving a lot of requests from Chennai fans for a concert in their city. They are known for experimenting with R&B and hip-hop in their own compositions, in an effort to not align with the popular notion of K-pop.
“Most of us got into this field to express ourselves through our music. Singing and performing gave me the chance to rediscover myself” said rapper Myoeng-Won-Son, whose stage name is Rockdaily, recalling how he was not encouraged to pursue his passion by his family.
As the K-pop aficionados in the city prepared to leave, the anticipation for the next event was evident on their faces, and the Consul-General’s promise of two events per year didn’t seem like a bad offer at all.
