How did American music influence Korean music of the past and of the present? Are the influences of the past still prominent in Kpop today?
Korean music of the past and the present have been deeply influenced by American music, and the influences of the past are still very important in Kpop nowadays. The American culture was widely spread to Korea in the Korean War era. The radio programs which brought by the American armies were the major media in Korea at that time, and this made the Korean people listen to American pop music very often. Television broadcasts and American movies were also passed to Korea.
At the end of the war, many American soldiers stayed in South Korea and did not move out. They also set up camp towns across the entire country, and many military shows had been established for American soldiers’ entertainment (Shin 2009: 92). The Korean people were able to earn money by performing in front of the American soldiers. In order to participate in the show, the Korean people had to learn how to sing English songs and play different Western instruments. The performers were graded regularly by the American. If they got high scores, then they were sent to perform in front of the officers which were the highest class and obtained a higher pay. Otherwise, they had to stay in the camp towns. On the other hand, some Korean agencies were developed to train the Korean musicians based on the standard of the American. The music styles, song themes and fashion were greatly influenced by the American too.
Comparing to the present, there are some popular Korean TV audition music shows recently which are also influenced by the American. The most well-known audition show in Korea would be Produce 101in 2016. It was a series of TV program about 101 female trainees fight for victory through various missions. The ideas of these Korean audition shows were very similar to those in America such as American Idol. Both Korean and American audition shows are competitions that are used to discover some potential talented people.
In addition, the American influences of the past are still remarkable in today’s Kpop. Some American style music are combined with Korean culture these days. Trots which were also influenced by American music are still being used nowadays. Some young singers like Hong Jin-young are still singing trots in this Kpop world. Also, the songs in Korea are regulated through censorship system which were inspired by the American during the war. The songs are required to be checked before releasing to the audiences. As we can see, the past is still influencing the Korean music today.
Citation:
Shin, Hyunjoon, and Ho, Tung-hung. “Translation of ‘America’ during the Early Cold War Period: A Comparative Study on the History of Popular Music in South Korea and Taiwan.” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies10, no. 1 (2009): 83-102.
“How K-pop became a global phenomenon” Vox. https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/2/16/16915672/what-is-kpop-history-explained (accessed 10/1/2018).
Hi, I think your opinion is very true. Korean music is influenced by American music since long time ago (war ear), and still has very important influences nowadays. During the war ear, the American soldiers become the major audience. The purpose of the show is to entertain their audience, so Korean performers have to understand the preferences of American soldiers. Korean performers come to realize that the traditional music style of Korea would not be able to drive the American soldiers’ attention, therefore, they have to balance their performance style between their national Korean style and the American style. In addition, they would get higher pay if the higher class of the American interested in their performance, like troop officers. The Korean music is influenced by American’s style throughout history. Till present, American music style still plays an important role in worldwide, and it contains so many genres of music. Not only many genres are invented in America, such as hip-pop was developed by Africa American, but also, they spread out through various kinds of media successfully. Hip-pop becomes a major trends of music style after jazz or rock nowadays, which favored by young people. In America, hip-pop can be very rude, because it allows every singer to relieve their felling and tell their stories with violent lyrics. However, when hip-pop comes to Korea, Korean singers are forbidden to use violent lyrics, even negative emotional lyrics is undesirable in Korean from history. Therefore, Korean singers keep only the style of the music and blend other Korean style things into their music, such as Korean style of dance and clothing of performance. As they developed through time, Korean music kind has the uniqueness of their style. However, the audience is not the American soldiers anymore, it is gradually towards international audience, but still including American, also other countries. As I mentioned previously, American music still plays a key role of music style worldwide, if Korean music wants to become globally, they would still be making music that favored by Americans and audience from other countries. That may explain why Korean music is influenced by American from past and still prominent in Korean music today.
Hey, Cherry. I am totally agreeing with your opinion. Korean music and American music have deeply relationships and based on war ear American music influences Korean music until now. As soon as war ear, lots of Americans soldiers stayed in Korean. I think it is a main reason of Korean music become more international and even more American style in history. As Cherry said, if Korean people would like to earn money from American soldiers, they have to learn some American music and try to learn English as well. However, trying to learn English just the based thing they need to do. If they really want to get high pay, they should learn some music which American soldiers interested in and make their performance better or balance the Korean style music and American music style.Back to Discussion #1, I said hip-pop music is a good way to appeal a country’s music. So it is also the reason American music still have influence Korean music now days. In present, American music has higher position and reputation in the world. American music is also developing new style of music. Hip-pop music is from Africa American, those people use hip-pop style to sing their life, attitude, religion etc. The temple is fast and the words are blurry. Some hip-pop music the words are dirty and violent, may lots of traditional Korean people cannot accept. However, I think it is a reflection of most people’s life and American rappers have coverage to sing it. They do not sing for music; they sing for life. It is also a big trend for Korean music style. In past years, Korean music is too traditional, it could not catch American’s attention. But in now days, more and more rappers appear in Korean and their style is similar with American hip-pop music. Although, the words of Korean hip-pop music are not too open rather than American hip-pop. They find a new genre, a new experience of music.
As Cherry said, even though American music influence Korean music a lot. Korean music still keeps their old style music such as Trots. Lots of American like trots as well. As a result, Korean music and American music influence each other and combined their style together to make more good music to audience. Right now, Korean music became more stylish and the audience became strong and American music still have the higher position.
Hi Cherry, thanks for the post and I also agree with your view on the influence of American music in Korean music industries. Being consistent with Cherry, I would also say that the American culture slowly infiltrated the Korean society during the Korean war and the impact of American music is still prominent nowadays. Just like you mentioned in the post, music performances at camp towns were set up for ex-patriots to attend entertainment shows that were American based or American made. Becoming an artist in Korea was not an easy task, to begin with, military show performers not only had to master the language of English but also perform American-related instruments. I was very impressed by the variety of musical instruments each artist learned to play, more specifically, the Kim Sisters. They were each talented at a certain task within the group and deserved to perform for a living in the United States between the 1950s-1960s. This Korean-born American singing trio performed pop music the way Americans wanted and became the first Korean singing group to succeed in the American music industry.
It was interesting to read about the ranking system imposed of Korean performers at Military shows, the determination and hard work needed in order to perform in front of high ranking officers was not lightly forgotten and impressed me a lot. Civilians in rural areas would want to perform in camp towns to earn as much money as possible by learning the dialect spoken by the Americans and learn American culture through music and dancing. The acceptance of American music was also evident with Trot music, this style of music was very popular post-Korean war and remained to be popular with elders who preferred to listen to slower and clearer music. On the other hand, hip-hop became the leading genre for pop music and penetrated the Korean market due to rhyme and style fitted with the younger generation.
A younger group who believed in rebelling against the status quo and protest against control.
Before taking this course, I was clueless about the success of Korean-born performers in America for such a long time. The fact that Koreans were motivated enough to acquire a foreign language and learn western music instruments was optimistic for America as they reach a step closer to global domination. This American influence also extends to talent shows where music industries began to search for potential talents at the singing competition just like “The Voice”, “X Factor”, or “America’s Got Talent”.
In any circumstance, I feel that past events will strongly influence what happens in the present. In the example of modern day K-pop, there have been many influences over the years which have contributed to the genre that is produced today. Simply by judging the difference between Korean traditional music, and contemporary K-pop we can see that there are many more influences that went into changing the music so drastically.
As it is known to me, K-pop usually seems to consist of upbeat, fast paced music accompanied by a fancy music video. It has honestly surprised me that it has spawned from traditional Korean music which we have learned to consist of instruments that we would typically associate with an orchestra.
I find it particularly interesting how much of a cultural impact the overseas deployment of American troops has had on Korean culture. By providing the market and the capital for the music industry to really excel in Korea, the American’s in turn facilitated a change in the Korean music industry to the benefit of American consumers. I think this is what initiated a sort of fascination between the two cultures, and eventually progressed to Seo Taeji’s introduction of the hip-hop scene into Korean music.
It is interesting then, that despite the clear outside influences that have gone into creating the modern k-pop music, it remains nationalistic of Korea. Whenever you see a k-pop performance, it is instantly recognizable as being Korean. Despite the western influences, the general perception of k-pop performances is that it elicits a sense of Asian culture.
I wonder then, that if the Cultural technology that Lee Soo-Man claims to possess adds to or takes away from the nationalistic elements contained in K-pop. While the theory is that by having elements of different cultures within the performance, more people will be able to adopt a liking towards it. While in theory this seems like it would dilute the notion of K-pop as being Korean, so far this has not been the case.
Hi Cherry!
Thank you for sharing your perspective on this week’s chosen question. It was very insightful to read!
I also wanted to add that Dr. Saeji has also mentioned in her lecture last week that in the past, many Koreans performed for American Military Base Shows, which were commonly known as Mipalgun Shows. Many of these performers, mainly females, were to perform American music for the Americans with a mix of an oriental theme. Hence, many of these Korean performers were praised and heavily compensated for being able to reenact and to adopt Western culture music. A great example would be The Kim Sisters. These Korean-born American singing trios have become a success because they were to assimilate to American’s pop culture, but to also to be noticed as a distinctive group due to their oriental backgrounds. They also comprise with American music by adding in Korean instruments and by wearing stage clothes that explicitly differentiate themselves from Western society such as Chinese long dresses.
I also found it so fascinating when you mentioned how American reality tv shows like “American Idol,” can be also found in the Korean TV shows within their own version. This really shows us how powerful Western cultures have upon other countries. Not only are these music audition shows are popular in Korea, but it also present in other countries like China. I believe that as an Asian descent, we hold such great value towards American culture. It is really embedded in us that American culture is what we strive for and believe in as what is the best. But why do you think that?
There is no doubt that the American culture has heavily influenced Korean pop culture. This can also be shown in another famous pop-star, Seo Taeji. Because of his Los Angeles experience, he was able to introduce “hip-hop” to the Korean markets. If you were to watch a Korean music video today, you can agree that there is very little or rarely any symbols that reflect upon the Korean culture. Not even a single symbol that reflects upon Asian culture. So ultimately, linking back to our first discussion, what can K-pop idols do to present “nationalism” within their artistic content? Do you think if they did focus more on Korean culture, would K-pop today be as popular?