Korean pop fanatics from four schools in the Austin area joined together to perform at the first annual K-pop Night at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy (LASA) on May 5. Students who are members in their school’s K-pop groups performed covers to their favorite K-pop songs for about an hour.

“I enjoy covering songs because it’s a really fun way to be involved in the K-pop community,” Katie Chung ‘19 said. “Dancing has been a hobby of mine for a while, so that’s another reason why I enjoy doing it. It actually teaches us a lot of things as well, like coordination, determination, and especially teamwork.”

The K-pop community has become huge in recent years, as people took a liking to the diverse groups and their multitude of talents, such as a combination of singing and dancing, addicting melodies, and original fashion choices. This in turn generated more and more support among high school students, many of them banding together to create their own groups where they cover and emulate the artists that they adore.

“The K-pop club community in high schools around Austin is a lot bigger than you probably think,” Elizabeth Wolf ‘20 said. “At K-pop Night, we had an amazing turn out, with about four awesome groups doing amazing covers of different K-pop artists. My favorite cover was Westwood’s very own, Catallena, made up of me, Katie Chung, and George Ruhlman ‘20. This was because it was really weird and a lot of fun to pull off. Overall, K-pop Night was a huge success, and it was really fun seeing the different groups showcase what they have been working on the entire year.”

Westwood’s K-pop group, KCrookd, performed five covers in the overall performance, including crowd favorites such as Playing with Fire by BlackPink, Boss by NCT, and Boom Boom by MomoLand, as well as two new pieces, Fingertip by GFriend, and Catallena by Orange Caramel.

“I think the best part about K-pop night was definitely how all the high schools came together and could connect through something as simple as a music genre,” Nikita Karthik ‘20 said. “I’m really happy with how the night the turned out and that LASA pulled this together, because it was a great way to meet new friends with the same interest as me too.”

Along with KCrookd, LASA’s ChoreoPop, McNeil High School’s K-pop Club, and AEON, a small group from Dallas also showed off their talent and devotion at K-pop Night. The groups hope to see each other again in years to come, and anticipate that this will be the first of many K-pop Nights to come.