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MU:CON 2018 : Laying the foundations for ‘the next step’ for Korean music in the world

Expanding our musical identity: Toward ‘the next step’ for Korean music in the world

We live in the age of K-Pop. It seems like just a few years ago the term inspired nothing more than a confused response from most.
But today, K-pop is a phenomenon not only its fans but music industry professionals and music consumers the world over cannot help but recognize.
However, the popularity we are seeing today was not achieved overnight, nor was it a matter of luck. It is the inevitable outcome of the efforts of many in the Korean music industry to develop overseas sales routes and stay current with global trends, not to mention the endless dedication of Korean musicians working day and night to create good music.
The ‘2018 Seoul International Music Fair’ (MU:Con 2018, hereinafter Mucon), which took place for 3 days starting on September 10th and was hosted by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Creative Contents Agency, was an opportunity to explore means by which Korean music, the leader of the Korean Wave, could make inroads into even more overseas markets.
Mucon included ‘Mucon Live,’ which features stage performances from Korean musicians in a variety of genres, ‘Mucon Network’ for business matching between domestic musicians and overseas performance business professionals, and ‘Mucon Talk’ featuring conferences and lectures for and by musicians and music industry professionals both domestic and international, all under the main theme ‘Expand Your Music Identity.’
The musicians who took to the stage for Mucon Live will be given the opportunity to take part in the ‘Pitching and Choice’ program involving 65 music industry professionals from 18 countries, which could lead to the chance to perform at some of the world’s major music festivals. The teams selected as the final winners will receive funding to participate in overseas festivals next year, pending final negotiations between the KCCA, overseas festival directors, and booking agents.
The lineup for the live performances held in venues in Sangam and Hongdae over some four days showcased the variety of the Korean popular music industry, spanning numerous genres including jazz, hip hop, rock, R&B and fusion.
‘Mucon Talk’ was a rare opportunity to hear famous musicians working in the field and industry professionals discuss the business of music and specific approaches to making inroads into overseas markets. Famous musicians including HAHM Choon-Ho, HAN Sang-Won and YOON Il-Sang and domestic and overseas professionals in the technologies and industries that will determine the future of the music industry shared their individual visions and knowledge with the audience.
We took a closer look at one session which was particularly related to an important agenda item at Mucon: K-pop in the world.

Prerequisites for K-pop in the greater world, according to global musical professionals

Trends in the world music market have been rapidly shifting over the last few years. Amid these shifting trends, the image of Asian music, including Korean music, has completely changed.
Mucon was a venue to gather major overseas music market players in one place to discuss the background to K-pop’s global success and the changes to come in the future.
The discussion was moderated by Billboard's K-pop columnist Jeff Benjamin, and the panel included well-known industry professionals such as Priya Dewan of American music distributor The Orchard who signed BTS, and John Pantle, tour and events expert and Vice President of the APA Agency, who has experience arranging upwards of 2,500 corporate events for the likes of Disney and Microsoft.
They analyzed the changes in the way overseas markets view Asian music, and discussed obstacles that need to be overcome for ‘trendy’ K-pop to enter its next stage of growth.
John Pantle explained how the American market's reception of Asian music is changing. He commented: "The biggest change we realized was that the broad category of ‘Asian Artist’ is completely falling apart on the American continent, and that subcategories such as ‘K-pop artist’ or ‘J-pop artist’ have become more important to consumers.
In this regard, I think that the impact of BTS on consumption trends in the American market has been as big as their sales. Just like the election of Barack Obama transformed conceptions of race in the United States, BTS has brought down the cultural boundaries in consumption patterns, which had until now been thought of as an innate characteristic of the American music market.”
Meanwhile, Gonzalo Garcia from NoiX Entertainment, who has been hosting K-pop performances in South America since 7 years ago when the popularity of K-pop was nothing like it is today, said that greater growth for K-pop requires that overseas audiences be able to consume K-pop on a more everyday basis than they do currently.
He recommended that a variety of new attempts be made: “There need to be more efforts made to have Korean music contents reach ‘general audiences’ overseas.
What is especially necessary is exclusive activity across North and South America. In Chile, for example, the channels through which consumers can encounter K-pop are extremely limited, Youtube being one. Despite that, when GOT7 visited Chile last month, more than 1,000 gathered to see them. That’s without any sort of promotion through any media (other than Youtube). If more active efforts are made, I feel we can definitely expect even better results.”
We hope to see K-pop’s stature grow through new innovation and efforts, and to continue to progress and expand.

BANG, Seung Eon

Photos by MOON Gyeong-Lok