Thirteen performers went up the stage to compete for this year’s Changwon K-Pop World Festival at the Hall E of the Stadthalle Vienna on Saturday, June 16. A mixed-group, Young Blood grabbed the grand prize this year.
With the popularity of the Boyband BTS, it is no doubt that their music and dance moves were seen the most during the program, with Mic Drop being performed thrice throughout, Fake Love and DNA once each. The winning team, Young Blood, chose Mic Drop as their second performance.
Red Velvet’s Peek-a-boo was played twice as did Rollercoaster by Chungha.
1st place: Young Blood
2nd Place: #S9
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Popularity Award: 19’s
DeVision, an all-male group was the first to show off their powerful movements dancing to BTS’ Fake Love and Mic Drop.
Soloist Gino showed his grace on stage accompanied by the upbeat rhythm of Seventeen’s Very Nice (he completed the look with suspenders as can be seen in the original Music video of the song).
Seoul S2stars began with a Pop Ballad: Mamamoo’s Paint Me. The audience started turning their phones on flashlight mode as makeshift lightsticks and sang along (see below video). The duo then shifted to a more summer-y jam feel of Spica’s Tonight. The hosts pointed out that they are their favourites, but they’re also obviously the crowd favourite early in the program.
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Read about Electronic Sports Festival 2018 here.
An all-girl group clad mostly in black, #S9, took a different twist – rendering Seventeen’s Clap into their own expressive version that won them second place.
The only female soloist of the night, Veri (colourful), danced to the up-tempo pop beat of Red Velvet’s Peek-A-Boo.
Next up the line of talented youngsters is KTS-NG, giving off a performance of Pentagon’s first top hit on World Digital Song Sales, Shine.
One of the cutest ensembles to grace the stage that day is Peony, this now four-member group danced to Hyuna’s Lip and Hip, and Chungha’s Rollercoaster.
Tenzin‘s solo act, two of BTS’ : Mic Drop and DNA, showed that it’s still possible to perform these on solo.
Re- Statice, is the second group to dance to Red Velvet’s Peek-A-Boo, and did so gracefully, I personally find them to be the most photogenic among the performers.
Newcomer group 19’s performed Momoland’s Boomboom and Weki Meki’s La La La much to the audience surprise. They bagged the Publikums Award (popularity vote) for this year’s competition. You can view their full performance in the video below.
SimpleX took on 4MINUTE’s Crazy dance performance to a T.
This year’s winner, Young Blood, is a mixed group of 2 males and 3 females with an awesome choreography of Jessi’s Gucci and BTS’ Mic Drop.
The girly group Re:Tx‘s rendition of Chungha’s Rollercoaster closed the evening’s performances but there were also special numbers by a kids group, K-Pop Küken and last year’s winner STB (watch video above).
This year’s show was hosted by Jasmina and Phil. The K-Pop World Festival is a K-Pop theme dance and singing competition, which has been annually organized by South Korea’s Foreign Ministry in cooperation with the television station “KBS” since 2011. A handful of countries hold preliminary rounds to find their respective finalists where an expert jury in Korea then selects the candidates to take part in the grand finale in Changwon.
This year’s festival has also been organized by Mindeullae and the Embassy of the Republic of Korea in Vienna and with the cooperation of the Wiener Stadthalle. After a rush of spectators last year, the organizers and the Stadthalle Vienna were able to negotiate an increased capacity for this year’s show. 축하해요 ! Winners will vie for the 2018 Changwon K-POP World Festival in September.
