Last year, large scale Kpop concerts in Australia, Japan, Thailand and other countries were successfully held and this year, MBC, one of the leading forces behind the world’s Hallyu craze is set to bring Kpop to the home of mainstream music from all over the world, the United States of America.

Come May 20th, the ‘MBC Korean Music Wave in LA’, jointly organized by MBC and SM Town, will be held at Honda Centre in Anaheim, California.

The concert which will be headlined by leaders of Kpop craze from SM Entertainment such as Girls’ Generation, TVXQ, SHINee, f(x), etc is seen as a very different and huge project compared to the Hallyu concerts organized before it. There is already a growing anticipation among Hallyu fans towards the May 20th concert.

The large-scale Hallyu concert will be aired as ‘MBC Korean Music Wave in LA – SM Town Special!’ and besides the performances, backstage scenes will also be revealed through the broadcast.

In addition to the concert in LA, other dates for the ‘SMTOWN LIVE WORLD TOUR Ⅲ’ were also announced, including August 4th and 5th in Tokyo Dome, Japan and August 18th in Seoul Jamsil Main Stadium. ‘SMTOWN LIVE WORLD TOUR Ⅲ’ is also expected to be held in Beijing and other major cities in Asia and other parts of the world.

Credit: isportskorea.com+ newsen.com

Girls’ Generation and actor Lee ByungHun are among the big names acknowledged for their huge contributions to the development of Korean pop culture and arts.

On November 15th, Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism had announced the names of the recipients for ’2011 Korea Republic Pop Culture and Arts Awards’.

The recipients of this year’s Culture Awards are Shin YoungGyoon, Lee SooMan, Ha ChoonHwa, Shin JoongHyun, Yoo Ho and Oh SeungRyong.

Girls’ Generation who is the main driving force behind the Hallyu fever, received their well-deserved recognition when the girls were announced as one of the recipients of the Prime Minister’s Award.

Meanwhile, actor Jang GeunSuk, Beast, After School, CN Blue, ZE:A and Kim ByungMan will be receiving the Minister of Culture’s Award.

Lee ByungHun, Park JinYoung Yang HyunSuk and Kim GunMo on the other hand, are announced as the winners of the President’s Award.

The award ceremony which will take place at 6pm on November 21st in Olympic Hall, Jamsil, Seoul will be graced with performances from Girls’ Generation, Wonder Girls, Beast, After School and Taeyang.

Credit: eto.co.kr

As SNSD becoming more successful in Japan, they brought along “Korean Idol Syndrom”. Also, the weak hallyu market and entertainment industries started to prosper. Thus, the focus of hallyu is now mainly on artists and K-Pop instead of actors and dramas.

SM Entertainment (referred as SM), which led SNSD to their success, had raised their profit four times as that of the year before. Their profit exceeded 10,000,000,000 won. Last September, SM became the first Korea agency who held a concert in LA’s Staples Center.

Each member’s talents + SM’s system + Digital Media = SNSD

Since the 90s, SM gained experience in expanding its industry oversea through the activities of H.O.T, and S.E.S. Due to its experience in such an expansion, SM was able to bring SNSD, DBSK, and BoA to their success in world market.

The nine cute girls topped in Japan’s Oricon chart. Now, their value in both culture and marketing is rather impossible to estimate. Behind SNSD’s success, there is Kim Youngmin.

Kim Youngmin grew up in Japan since 6 years old. Thus, he knew about Japan’s entertainment industry better than anyone else. Because of this, he was able to put his experience and knowledge to good use and ‘channel the success’ to SM.

“Creating a star is like modifying a diamond. First you have to find a good diamond, and then you have to add the covering that best suits it. The nine talented girls, along with SM’s system and digital media; these three things brought success to SNSD“.

Kim Youngmin said that the most important factor of SNSD’s success was SNSD’s potential and talent. Next of it was SM’s system that could bring out their full potential. Also, digital media helps spreading SNSD to all over the globe.

Last August, right before SNSD’s debut in Japan, SM released Japanese Version of SNSD’s music video on YouTube. SM aimed to let Japanese get a better accessibility to the Music Video so that they would share it with other Japanese music lovers as well.

SM’s strategy in Japan was successful. Just after a week since the sale of “Gee (Japanese Ver.)”, SM sold 66,000 copies of the album. After that week, SNSD topped in the Daily Oricon chart.

SNSD did not have a proper activity last year. However this year, they have already done a CF for a Japanese product and they are now preparing for their new album and concerts.

SM’s Plans for 2011

“SM mainly focuses on producing good artists instead of expanding the industry. Oversea expansion is only successful if the market in Korea is successful. So we will continue to focus on the market in Korea.“

Since 1990, SM has simultaneously tried to produce successful artists. They have chosen people with potential not only from the audition in Korea every Saturday, but also through global auditions in Thailand, U.S.A, China, and so on.

SM provides a long-term 1 to 1 program to produce artists. In these programs, SM not only teaches vocal, acting, and dancing, but also foreign languages.

Also, SM is planning to let a new group debut. Kim Youngmin’s primary goal for the year is to launch the new group safely in the Korea music industry so that oversea expansion will be possible.

Secondly, he wants to show a “360˚ Business Model” to the global market.

In a “360˚ Business” the processes of casting, auditioning, education (includes vocal, acting, dancing, and foreign languages), album production, CF, concerts, movies, and dramas are all the responsibility of the agency.

Last year, SNSD successfully showed the “360˚ Business” BoA and DBSK have been working with Japanese agency when they were in Japan. However, SNSD worked with SM even when they were in Japan. Furthermore, SM stated that SNSD will probably be more successful as they are more than likely to participate in a drama, which SM has prepared for a long time.

Entertainment Industry Research & Development (R&D)

Kim Youngmin stated that the motivation for SM to lead the hallyu is ‘Continuous investment in R&D even when they have achieved success’.

“The method and systems used to create a star should receive more than the stars. Systems that plan and produce media and contents are the only way another ‘SNSD’ will be produced.”

Lastly, Kim YoungMin emphasized that to keep hallyu going, people have to focus more on the agencies that create stars rather than stars themselves. To ensure the progressiveness of hallyu, either YouTube or SM’s system should receive more attention.

Credit: bntnews.co.kr
Translated by: Taengfan@fanwonder.com

On January 22nd, SBS news reported on the ‘Digital Korean Wave‘ which is spreading far and wide beyond Asia.

Some of the featured video clips covered in the news include:

- Participants of a Brazilian beauty pageant last year dancing to Wonder Girls’ ‘Nobody’.
- Hundreds on Filipino inmates dancing to Super Junior’s ‘Sorry Sorry’.
- Female students in Chile performed a cover of SNSD‘s ‘Oh!‘ dance.

Kpop music videos are also being downloaded and viewed, even in countries with unfamiliar names such as Moldova, Malta, Mauritius, etc.

Google’s chairman, Seo Hwangwook said, “If the contents are good, many people around the world would see them. Since boundaries have no significance in this case, the Korean wave will spread far and wide”.

In the news, Taeyeon was also featured. The leader commented, “‘Please come and perform in our country’ – there have been a lot of such requests and so, our members too want to go overseas and meet our fans there”.

To watch the video clip of the news, go HERE!

Credit: nate.com/SBS.co.kr