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| K-pop girl group BLACKPINK / Courtesy of YG Entertainment |
K-pop acts to be featured in Coachella, Lollapalooza
By Dong Sun-hwa
A growing number of K-pop acts are headlining major music festivals around the world, taking the stage with today's most celebrated pop stars.
Girl group BLACKPINK is slated to headline the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, one of the largest music festivals in the U.S. established in 1999. The quartet will perform at Empire Polo Club in Indio, California, on April 15 and April 22 (local time).
BLACKPINK is the first Asian act to headline the music festival, which draws some 300,000 visitors every year. The group first appeared at Coachella in 2019, becoming the first K-pop artists to do so.
This year's Coachella will take place from April 14 to 23. Other headliners include Frank Ocean and Bad Bunny.
BLACKPINK is also a headliner for the upcoming British Summer Time (BST) Hyde Park festival (June 24 to July 8) on July 2 in central London. This is the first time the festival will have a K-pop group as its headliner. BLACKPINK will be joined by special guests including Sabrina Carpenter, Caity Baser, Mae Stephens and the Korean indie rock group The Rose. Other headliners are Billy Joel and P!nk. In 2022, the BST Hyde Park event attracted 65,000 people.
In August, boy group Tomorrow X Together (TXT) will headline another big music festival, Lollapalooza, along with six other acts including Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar and Lana Del Rey.
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| K-pop boy group Tomorrow X Together (TXT) / Courtesy of Big Hit Music |
The American festival will be held from August 3 to 6 at Grant Park in Chicago. Launched in 1991, Lollapalooza is one of the longest-running music festivals in the U.S. bringing in 400,000 people annually. It was initially a touring event, but Chicago recently became its permanent location.
Last July, j-hope of boy band BTS became the first K-pop act and K-pop headliner to be featured in Lollapalooza, commanding the stage with his solo releases including, "Arson." In the same year, TXT also made its appearance at the festival, becoming the first K-pop group to pull off the feat. Both TXT and BTS are represented by K-pop powerhouse HYBE.
NewJeans, another girl group under the HYBE umbrella, will also perform at this year's festival, although it is not a headliner.
Shortly before TXT and NewJeans make their appearances in Chicago, Stray Kids will headline Lollapalooza Paris ― the French edition of the U.S. festival ― on July 21. This is the first time that a K-pop group will headline this festival. Other headliners are Rosalia and Kendrick Lamar.
A crop of other K-pop artists such as Red Velvet and aespa will also perform at several high-profile music festivals. The former will appear at the Barcelona leg of the Primavera Sound 2023 in June, and the latter will perform at the Governors Ball Music Festival in the same month in New York. Aespa will also be featured in the Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival in San Francisco in August.
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