Why I Chose this topic
As I first started listening to Kpop, one of the biggest differences that I found was how different Korean Songs were from American/Britain Songs. I really enjoy pop music and I am a big fan of many famous pop artists. I used to listen to a lot of western popular music. This refers to hit songs, songs that were in the billboard top 100.
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Then one fateful day I was on youtube and I saw in my recommended videos "BTS AMA Performance". Pshhhhh I was not very interested but it was a new video and it already had millions of views so I (stupidly) clicked onto the link. I never knew that one click could change my life. (HAHA okay I am being melodramatic) But I really fell deep into the Kpop world after being exposed to the beauty that is Kpop.
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This is the video that ruined my life. (In a good way)
When I first started getting into BTS, I quickly realised 2 things.
1. Their Songs were very High
2. They Songs were very Different from Western Songs
Songs being in a high key
I already talk more on this in another page. I soon realised that BTS songs were very high, especially for a male group. I am a girl but I find it extremely difficult to sing and hit some of the notes in their songs in the original key. I was very confused at this as for western male singers, this is rarely the case.
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As I got more into Kpop, I realised this was a trend, and BTS is not the only boy group with a range that is high for males. Also, girl group songs are extremely high as well. I already have difficulty singing male group songs in the original key so I was very shocked to find out exactly how high some girl group songs actually are.
Songs Sounding different
I don't mean that the songs sound different in the sense of the language. (although that is no doubt a reason why it sounds different from western songs) I realised when I sang along to the songs it sounded a bit off and a bit weird.
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I have been going for vocal lessons as a music school called Unison Music Group for about 2 years and there, they teach me how to sing with Western Vocal Techniques. I started to think maybe some of the difference I was hearing was because of the placement of the voice by the different singers and also because of the different singing techniques used by the singers from the different countries.
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I decided to look into this more and to do some vocal analysis and research on this topic. I was unable to find any solid research papers done on this topic so I decided to use the minimal vocal analysis knowledge I had to analyse the techniques used and to get my vocal teacher to comment on my analysis and give me some of her input.
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The other few pages contain my analysis, some research I did, in-depth look at specific singers of popular music and also me singing a few covers so as to better show these differences instead of describe them.
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I hope that after visiting this website, you will leave seeing a difference in the two. However, I want to state that despite me trying to show a difference, I do not think one is superior to the other as I do enjoy and appreciate both singing techniques.
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Alright! On to the analysis!
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