At last, the very last round of jury comments for K-Singer Star began.
“Hm …”
Since taking part in the show Hyunseung had discovered one clear thing.
As obvious as it sounds, every judge sitting here carried a deep love for music.
Whenever they faced a truly good song, a fine voice, a brilliant stage, the change first showed on their faces.
They looked exactly like children who have just been handed their favorite treat.
Right now, their expressions were just like that.
The judges were about to speak on Yoon Jaeyi’s stage and a thick bliss coated every face.
Lee Young-ah, who had given the singer courage before she sang, lifted her microphone first.
“People say a good song always leaves an after-image. I think on my way home tonight I’ll still be hearing Yoon Jaeyi’s after-image. Thank you, it was beautiful.”
As though he had been waiting, Kim Gwang-jin continued.
“If music were ever put on display, I would want today’s stage by Jaeyi to be hung in the gallery. That is how enchanting it was. I listened with joy.”
Both of them were clearly holding back any direct comment about the songwriting itself.
Of course, it would be awkward to say whose composition was better while the writers were sitting right there.
Still, their words to Yoon Jaeyi held all the praise inside them.
“Often it is harder to explode a performer’s own zest on stage than to explode raw skill. I feel Yoon Jaeyi can do exactly that,” Won Jin-seop said, finishing his critique.
The stream of compliments halted for a moment. The next judge, Jayble, kept his lips firmly closed; it looked as if the words would not come easily.
He stayed silent so long the MC was about to move things along, when a low sound slipped into the mic.
“Mm …”
Jayble spoke.
“First …”
He turned and actually looked at Hyunseung.
“Was that song really written for a human being to sing?”
Hyunseung tilted his head, not knowing what that look meant. Was it a critique or a question? Should he answer? He hesitated.
“ It’s because of how difficult it is. The piece sits at the very top end of extreme difficulty.”
Facing the stage again, Jayble went on.
“The key keeps shifting almost every section, the overall modulation is intense. I think even many seasoned professionals would shy away from singing it live.”
He freely touched the subject everyone else had tip-toed around, the self-written songs.
“Yet in Yoon Jaeyi’s performance I never once felt she was chasing the song or struggling. It actually seemed perfect for displaying every charm her voice owns.”
The other judges tried to look nonchalant, but surprise flashed all the same. Everyone in show business here knew Jayble had no warm feeling toward HS, and for that reason was not fond of Yoon Jaeyi either.
But now…
“To put it simply, the genre of the song tonight felt like ‘Yoon Jaeyi’ itself. Thank you for the performance.”
He had just delivered the longest critique of the evening, and to Yoon Jaeyi of all people.
Even more, a pleasant smile rested on his face as he set down the microphone.
What’s this?
Inside his helmet Hyunseung raised his brows. He had expected Jayble to pick faults, but the man had finished with praise bordering on admiration. For someone who always acted like a stone statue, that gentle smile was unexpected.
Rather surprising, he thought, and a happy smile crept onto Hyunseung’s own lips, though no one could see it beneath the helmet.
Scores from the panel appeared. The MC spoke again.
“That puts Yoon Jaeyi ahead in the judges’ points, four-hundred-ninety-one out of five-hundred, eleven points higher than Kang Hajun’s four-hundred-eighty.”
A very fine lead.
With the closing of the live text voting near, the stage grew busy, readying a special performance.
Is it Hajun oppa’s special stage? Hyuna clasped her hands, full of expectation.
Suddenly the hall fell pitch dark.
— It is a noisy world we live in.
A rough male voice sounded while the main screen showed moonlit waves rolling on a night sea.
— You will probably always dwell inside the calm.
On the second line a soft light spilled over the man standing on stage.
I know this song…
Hyuna narrowed her eyes at the man’s face; the melody was so familiar.
— There were times I almost felt relieved for that.
She could never mistake it. She had searched it out and listened to it again and again, heard it everywhere, and cried to it many times.
It was her brother’s solo-album title track, written for their father.
Yet she was hearing it live for the very first time.
She tapped her father’s arm and signed quickly.
Dad, the song Moon Beom-jae is singing now is Dear My Beethoven, the one Oppa wrote.
Yes, I thought so. Seeing him sing it in person lets the feeling come through even stronger.
Her father’s quiet smile looked somehow sad, even slightly tormented.
Dad…
She turned her eyes forward again.
— Let us please live, live on.
— Let us live on.
Moon Beom-jae’s voice dragged every bit of sorrow and longing out of the song.
When it ended, the hall was filled not with applause at first but sniffles.
Hyuna did not cry. Instead, she clapped hard and cheered. Her brother had poured not only grief but hope into the song, the earnest wish that their family would live happily together.
Beside her, her father seemed composed, yet under the returning house lights, she saw the redness in his eyes and the trembling of the hand he had clenched tight.
“Dad …”
She almost called out aloud, then bit her lip. She remembered how Oppa once said adults cry too and at such times it is kinder to look away.
She raised her head, blinking back her own tears, and signed with a brave smile:
Dad, the stage is over. We should applaud.
Her father turned to the stage—really, to his son—and applauded with strength.
After Moon Beom-jae’s special stage the hall was a curious mix of sobs and clapping.
Until yesterday, Hyunseung had thought it would not matter if Yoon Jaeyi lost. He was not one to feel hurt pride over such things, and a good stage would be remembered anyway. They could work together plenty from now on within the same company.
But, having played his hidden card tonight, he no longer wanted to lose. He glanced at Moon Beom-jae below the stage; that appearance must have moved the results.
I really should give him a song soon. He probably did not do this expecting one, but morally I owe him.
Judging from his family’s wild applause, it had been worth asking Beom-jae to sing Dear My Beethoven.
The MC called the two finalists to center stage.
“In the jury points Yoon Jaeyi leads Kang Hajun, but the game is not over yet. We still have the advance on-line votes and the live text votes.”
Hyunseung nodded: audience votes could overturn any ranking; controversies always follow.
This season would certainly explode online, not only his and Jayble’s song battle but also the two contestants who had become the hottest topics.
They were called the revolt of the losers: Hajun, the miraculous comeback kid, and Jaeyi, the miracle HS saved. A little childish, but still.
“Live voting is now closed, messages sent afterward are invalid—please note that, viewers.”
The countdown on the screen hit zero. Only the final result remained, unknowable even to the judges.
Who will it be? He had made no lobbying inside the company; the tally was pure.
He looked over at Kang Hajun. The man had always held overwhelming popular support, but last round Jaeyi had almost caught him. The final winner would be whoever stirred viewers’ hearts more tonight.
The MC waved a cue card.
“The result is right here in my hand. Which of them will wear the crown as our first champion?”
The crowd shouted both names. Then he uttered the line audiences love to hate.
“We will reveal it after sixty seconds!”
But the audience kept chanting, unfazed.
Just then Hyunseung’s eyes narrowed; he swung his head.
“Kang Ha-…!”
There was his little sister, yelling Hajun’s name at the top of her lungs.
He lifted his goggle visor and glared; she clapped a hand over her mouth and pretended to look elsewhere.
Seriously…
He clicked his tongue and faced forward again as the ad break ended.
“Thank you for waiting through sixty seconds that felt like sixty minutes,” the MC said solemnly.
“Now, we announce the winner of national audition project K-Singer Star! ”
The two faces alternated on the giant screen.
“Oh — !”
The long journey was about to close.
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