The 17th Melon Music Awards Concluded Successfully with Top K-Pop Stars Including G-Dragon and Jennie in Attendance

The 17th Melon Music Awards (MMA), one of South Korea’s largest year-end music award ceremonies, was successfully held on December 20 at the Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul under the theme “Play the Moment.” Organized by Kakao Entertainment, the event began with a red carpet ceremony at 4 p.m. and the main program started at 5 p.m. Numerous top K-Pop artists attended this Melon Music Awards, including G-Dragon (BIGBANG), Jennie (BLACKPINK), Zico, Jay Park, EXO, Woodz, aespa, IVE, RIIZE, PLAVE, NCT Wish, Illit, Hearts2Hearts, All Day Project, and Alpha Drive One. Notably, EXO made history by returning to the Melon Music Awards stage after approximately 8 years, revealing a B-side track from their eighth studio album set for release in January next year. The event was hosted by actress Park Eun-bin, veteran singer-songwriter Yoon Jong-shin, and figure skater Cha Jun-hwan. The period for selecting this year’s award nominees ran from October 31 of last year to November 19 of this year. Since its inception in 2009, the Melon Music Awards has become one of South Korea’s most prestigious K-Pop award shows, hosted by the music streaming service Melon (Kakao’s music platform). Once a leader in South Korea’s music market, Melon has dropped to second place in terms of monthly active users due to the rapid growth of global platforms such as YouTube Music. The biggest feature of the Melon Music Awards is its evaluation system centered on music streaming. For the four main awards—Artist of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year, and Record of the Year—streaming popularity accounts for 60%, while juries’ votes and fan votes each account for 20%. The Record of the Year award is determined entirely by the juries based on musical quality. Physical album sales are not considered in the selection of top awards. Meanwhile, Jennie’s reaction during the ceremony sparked online debate. As footage of BTS receiving an award appeared on screen, Jennie appeared to maintain a neutral expression, leading some netizens to interpret it as “cold” or “bored.” However, other fans defended her by saying “a neutral expression does not always imply negative feelings.” Such reactions over facial expressions are common occurrences in the industry but did not overshadow the overall highlights of the night, including various memorable moments and joyful celebrations from the winners.