In perfect harmony with MayTree

WHILE South Korea is known for its bevy of K-Pop artistes, there are still a number of excellent artistes who perform in other musical genres.
Last month, Korea’s No.1 a ­cappella group MayTree ­represented its country at the 2014 World Choir Games in Riga, Latvia, and took home gold medals in both the jazz and popular choral music categories in this ‘Olympics’ for vocal groups.
The five-member group ­consists of percussionist Jang SangIn (S.I.), alto Kang SooKyung (Soo), tenor Chun SungHyun (Kipp), soprano Jung DaYoung and bass Kim WonJong.
MayTree was in Kuala Lumpur recently for a promotional tour organised by Acclaim Music, where the group performed at ­selected venues around the city.
Its members sat down for an exclusive interview with theSun, with Soo doing most of the talking as she helped explain how the group got its start.
Indicating S.I., she said: “He wanted to be an a cappella singer for a long, long time, since he was very young. So he decided to form a group in 2000, and held a lot of auditions.
“I was the first to be accepted, and Kipp, DaYoung and WonJong joined later at different times.”
Much like their varied repertoire – everything from The Sound of Music to Gangnam Style – the five have different interests and personalities, but have formed a firm friendship over the years.
“Maybe it’s the passion for music, for a cappella,” Soo said. “[Singing] a cappella is a very hard job actually, but it is very fun to make sounds together.”
Soo is also the group’s composer and has written a number of original a cappella songs.
Describing their creative process and how she converts a popular song into an a cappella version, she said: “Sometimes it’s difficult, and sometimes it’s very fun and easy.
“I hear the original song, and I just imagine how we can express the music with our MayTree flavour. I see all the different [layers] and sounds and imagine putting it together for us to sing.
“When we have a new song, we try to meet as often as we can. We rehearse the song, but we also just hang out together.”
Their rehearsal sessions can last four to five hours, which sounds like a short amount of time to most people, but Soo explains that it can still be a gruelling process.
“Recently, I caught a cold, and it was very hard to make the sounds,” Soo added. “We don’t have musical instruments, we are [the] musical instruments.
“And so, we have to stay healthy and on pitch. If one of us is ill or [off-key], it affects the whole group.”
Soo added that singing a cappella, while not as mainstream as K-Pop, has its advantages.
“The a cappella music scene in Korea and the rest of the world is very small, so when new audiences listen to our music, they find it unique.”
The five also keep in touch with their fans in Korea and all over the world through social media and their blog, with a number of their local fans turning up to see them during their performances in Kuala Lumpur.
Asked about their plans for the future, Soo said: “We want to have more and more original songs in our shows, since we have done so many cover songs.
“So I am trying to write the lyrics and the melodies for our group, and our next goal is to have them all on our next CD.”
MayTree is also planning more international tours next year, and hopefully, will return here for another performance in the near future.