I am a Pioneer

Festivities

November 31st 2012:

We've all been gathered in the living room of the dorm. All of us, including Ho Jung. This confused all of us, as he had been put into the last stand, meaning that he would have to sit out on the next challenge. As we were all sitting there wondering what was going to happen EVE turned on.

"Good morning trainees!" She says. "I have good news for you!" She continues. 

"I have your next mission. But this mission will not be counted as a challenge, so no one will be evaluated or eliminated. The only poll that will be used is the popular vote" She announces. We all cheer. We've been given a little respite.

"However, that does not mean that you are free. Starting from today you are all to split into pairs and prepare a Christmas performance that will be broadcasted live on Christmas eve. Your performance must be with a cover or original Christmas song that will include live singing and choreography. You will be performing in the Seol Olympic Stadium as part of a JYPE-organised Christmas event. Adam will explain the process of the popular vote later, but for now please begin preparing for the performance and have your duo submitted to the staff by the end of the day. Good luck, Fighting!" With that EVE shuts down and the room is quiet.

"Well now. Shall we start by organising our duos then?" Hyun-Shik breaks the silence. We very quickly begin talking amongst each other and trying to make pairs. In the end, they look like this:

1. Ho Jung & Seol Young

2. Sim Hyun-Shik & Ra Chan-wook

3. Sim Kyu-Bong & Chu Jin-Ho

4. Nam Youngjae & Akizuki Akira

5. Hayashi Roh & DongBang Kyong

We submit the duos and head of to begin preparing immediately. We have a little under 24 days to organise, practice and perfect a Christmas performance that we will give live. After spending about 3 hours flicking through Christmas songs and trying to decide on which one we would perform, we decided to sing a mashup of multiple songs. We figured that most duos will just pick one song and sing it all the way through. Kyu-Bong and I decided that we would pick multiple Christmas songs, and mix them together, while Kyu-Bong would also write a rap segment to add to it. The songs we chose for the Mash-up were Feliz Navidad, Do they know it's Christmas, Silent Night, and a song from Italy; Tu Scendi Dalle Stelle.

 We chose these songs, as they were songs that are known in various countries, but weren't the songs that are always played, like All I want for Christmas is you by Mariah Carey. Immediately after that, we headed to the studio so I could mash the songs. It was going to be hard, as they were all different songs in terms of lyrics, language and tempo. So I figured that I would make a single backing track, and reorganise the lyrics so we would sing various parts of each song at different intervals. This ended up taking about 4 days to complete as it was a very tough item to prepare. Kyu-Bong had also finished writing his rap lyrics, and so we spent the next day recording and perfecting the song. On the 5th day of working, we finally got the notification from ADAM on what the popular vote scoring would look like. So far 3 episodes of the show had been aired, so we had started to amass a following on social media which would come into play for the vote.

Our watches lit up and ADAM's voice began to speak. "Hello trainees, here is the outline of how popular vote scoring will work. It will be split into three aspects. First is social media following, which will provide you 25% of your popularity score, second is Remote viewer voting, which will also make up 25% of your score. Finally, we will have a live vote which will determine the remaining 50% of your popularity score. The standings will be dictated by the accumulative points of all three sections. That is all from me, good luck with your preparations." ADAM turned back off, and we are left to our own devices again.

 Kyu-Bong and I finish up the recording the next day. I managed to convince him to take some of the vocal parts and spent the entire 4th day coaching him and advising him on his technique. He has a really nice, soothing singing voice, but he doesn't seem to have enough confidence to use it. I felt like this might be the best opportunity possible to give him some confidence and help him escape from the path that at this rate, will lead to his elimination.

 After we finish recording on the 5th day, we listen to it a couple of times before heading to the dance practice room. Everyone else seems to be taking their time with the songs, as Hyun-Shik and Hayashi's teams are still recording, while Akira's team is still working on learning the lyrics. Meanwhile, Ho Jung and Seol Young don't seem fazed even though they have barely started. I'm pretty sure all that they have done is chosen the song they will perform with. We spent the next 6 days working on the choreography. I had to make it powerful enough for people to enjoy and remember it, but easy enough that Kyu-Bong and the backup dancers could learn it fast and perfect it quickly. Once we had that figured out, we prepared the clothing that we would wear, which was just a Santa outfit minus the beard. While the backup dancers would dress like elves. We then spent the next week practising the choreography over and over until we were all in sync and perfected the moves. 

Following that, we spent another 6 days practising the full choreography with live singing included. This allowed me to further improve Kyu-Bong in his confidence and ability. His confidence was slowly beginning to rise, especially after the backup dancers and staff all complimented him on his singing when they heard it for the first time. 

We then ran through 2 full dress rehearsals on the 23rd, the day before the show. I believed that we were ready. Kyu-Bong was nervous but remained determined to perform at his best. The first dress rehearsal was a struggle for him as he was trying to get used to the outfit, dance and singing. But following the second rehearsal, he looked ready to go. I advised him to practice on his own in his room a couple of times before he went to bed that night, as the next day was the event.