ARTIST OF THE WEEK - Jang Yoon Jung

For a change, we are going to feature a trot (traditional Korean pop songs) artist this week. Jang Yoon Jung is known as "the BoA of trot" in Korea. Her sudden rise to popularity last year with the song "어머나" (Oh, My Goodness) brings a lot of younger audiences to listen to trot music. After her success a lot more younger trot artists get into the scene, e.g. LPG, Iris, Tutti, etc. Jang Yoon Jung was a surprise winner of the "gold award" in the female singer category on our 2005 Soompi Gayo DaeSang Award Show, beating out BoA and Gummy. She was also named one of the top 10 singers on MBC’s 2005 Gayo Year End Award Show. Here is some more info on Jang Yoon Jung:

Date of birth : February 16th, 1980
Education : Youngshin Girls’ High School, Dept. of Broadcasting & Entertainment of Seoul Arts College
Debut : Grand Prize MBC Riverside Song Festival (1999)
Physique : 168cm, 48kg
Blood type : B
Hobbies: Watching movies, swimming

Jang Yoon-jung is the winner of the grand prize in the Riverside Song Festival held by MBC in 1999. The title of the song that won the contest was “You Inside Me,” a Latin dance number. As a 20-year-old, Jang Yoon-jung performed the fast beat dance song with power showing off her energy and eventually grabbed the top place in the contest. Four years later, Jang returned to the pop music world as an enchanting singer of “Trot” music, Korean traditional style pop song. Instead of upbeat dance music, Jang had converted to a style of music mostly enjoyed by music fans of older age groups. Then what was the reason for such a change in the musical genre Jang Yoon-jung pursued? Right after the Riverside Song Contest, Jang had signed a contract with a relatively big record company, but even after a couple of years, she didn’t have the chance to record her own album. To make things worse, the financial condition of Jang’s family underwent a crisis that led her to despair and not knowing where she was heading for in the music world. Then one day, she received and unexpected proposal. The E-mecca Entertainment, Jang’s current management agency contacted her asking if she was interested in doing “Trot” music. At first, Jang thought it was a ridiculous idea for her to sing trot songs, but as she thought of her previous experience of appearing on the stage of “The Nationwide Singing Contest,” a long-running weekly show on KBS 1TV in which amateur singers compete their singing talents, Jang realized it was a new beginning for her musical career. The song “Oh, My Goodness” was her debut number that made Jang known to almost all the people in the country the young and old alike. Since April, 2005, Jang Yoon-jung also made her debut in Japan with her biggest hit song “Oh, My Goodness.”

Credits: KBS World