American Idols: the MJ connection

[arbitrary_greay]

I think most of us were fans in time for the glorious glut of special stages at the end of 2009, when every Kpop awards/end-of-year festival under the sun included at least one Michael Jackson tribute. It really highlighted how much Kpop has been so heavily influenced by the man, both in sound and style.

Comments

[bluecod]

Think I got short end of the stick; only found out what SNSD was 2 weeks before Hoot came out. Anyhow, good stuff AG. Now let me be a sponge and come up with a worthy response later!

[arbitrary_greay]

Ah, that's a real shame. I was already half checked-out by Hoot. XD If you look at greywing's archives from that time, you'll see how we were before cynicism had truly set in. XD

[greywing]

LOL, are you saying my archives are "Ghost of SNSD-fen Past"?

[arbitrary_greay]

Ghost of SNSD_FFA past. :P

[just_keep_on]

This is all sorts of fascinating, seriously! How'd you even find all of this?!?

It's really interesting to see how much of what we think of as "pop choreography" (for lack of a better term) actually has its basis in Broadway (and then to go backwards from that too, like ballet! Btw, this kid is a fantastic ballerina and she's only freakin 14. Also, this is the most *hilarious* ballet clip ever: The Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland 8DD). I think it's kind of sad that there appears this divide between "classical" dance and "modern" dance, when really the two go hand in hand - just like music.

K-pop choreography is interesting because it seems to be jumping in from the side, from locking, which came from J-pop, but now J-pop choreo and K-pop choreo have become pretty different. It's still very different from current American pop choreo, which seems to be more club-based (but I'm guessing here - I've not kept up with American pop for a while ^^;).

Actually, huh, in light of this article on Gene Kelly (or rather the film series

[arbitrary_greay]

I was already familiar with Fosse as a performer, and then I learned about his choreography work, and then I found that Billie Jean mashup, which eventually led me to the origin of the moonwalk and the MJ's influences videos. I found the West Side Story video a long time ago while searching for an upload of "Cool," and once I saw Smooth Criminal's MV I knew there had to be a Bandwagon Ballet connection.

Heh, in Mozart's time ballet was SCANDALOUS~. Wonder what they'd think of the pussy-popping dances of today. I'm glad shows like SYTYCD are helping to bridge the gap. But it's interesting that some dances, like clogging, explicitly specify a traditional category. In some respects I can sympathize, as I grit my teeth whenever people try to modernize tango by dancing it to music that is NOT TANGO. (Kpop is one of the worst offenders for this, grrrr

[brackdiamon]

Back in 2009 I turned my nose up at K-pop apart from DBSK because it just looked like a bunch of people that didn't really know hot to dance or sing that well, but this just reminds me of the dance line's Smooth Criminal and Janet covers. Watching those dance battles is probably something everyone who at least calls themselves an SNSD fan should do, if only to see their real potential.

[arbitrary_greay]

I miss dance line routines. :( The solo stages just aren't the same. And while SNSD's formation work is so much more advanced, nothing in their recent dances pops out at me to say "these girls have above-average dance talent" the way their showcase routines used to. A Kpop newbie shown Flashback and Paparazzi back to back would probably choose AS as the better dancers.