K-pop award shows are getting increasingly popular, and new fans are venturing into learning the history of Korean Pop Music. Daesang is a term that often comes up in K-pop vocabulary. It is the category of award that is reserved at the end and remains the most prestigious.
In recent times, the K-pop history-making group BTS has snagged the most number of Daesangs with their chart-topping albums. Another newbie group, NewJeans, showed immense impact by snagging multiple Daesangs right after their debut.
Meaning of Daesang?
Daesang in K-pop is one of the highest achievements a group or artist can achieve. Winning a Daesang or a grand prize reflects the success of the records released by artists that year and how many copies they sold, physically and digitally.
Daesang goes beyond K-pop. Korean award shows for K-dramas, Korean variety shows, and movies also give out Daesangs at the year-end ceremony. Daesang is considered the biggest award of a Korean ceremony and generally goes to the deserving artist whose impact has exceeded expectations.
New fans often don’t know the difference between the terms Daesang and Bonsang. While Daesang means ‘grand prize,’ Bonsang refers to ‘main prize.’ For the Bonsang Award, ceremonies choose a handful of artists worthy of the title.
While winning both Daesang and Bonsang is extremely difficult, Daesang holds more impact as the biggest prize.
K-pop Daesang winners
Over the years, K-pop fans have seen intense competitions between the top groups to snag the ultimate prize, Daesang. BTS holds the most Daesang wins, with over 74 Daesangs from their debut.
The K-pop septet won their first Daesang for Album of the Year with ‘The Most Beautiful Moment in Life: Young Forever’ at the 2016 Melon Music Awards. The first Daesang signaled an era of BTS dominating every award show. They continued winning all the categories of Daesang for the next couple of years.
In 2019, BTS made history at the most prestigious K-pop award show- Mnet Asia Music Awards. The group swept up all the categories of Daesang, including Artist Of The Year, Song Of The Year, Album Of The Year, and Worldwide Icon Of The Year.
BTS kept up the momentum in 2020, again sweeping the Melon Music Awards and the Mnet Asian Music Awards in all major categories.
Along with BTS, two other K-pop groups who made a mark in K-pop Daesang history are EXO and TWICE. SM Entertainment’s EXO won over 23 Daesangs over their decade-long career.
EXO won the first Daesang Award at the 2013 MAMA Awards in the Album Of The Year category for their first studio album, XOXO.
TWICE, on the other hand, won over 18 Daesangs since their debut. They received their first grand prize at the 2016 Melon Music Awards for the song Cheer-Up. The group later made history as the girl group with the most Daesang wins.
Right after TWICE, YG Entertainment’s famous boy group BigBang holds the fourth position of Daesangs. The boy band has got over 13 Daesangs. The group snagged their first Daesang at the Mnet KM Music Festival in 2007 in the Song of the Year category for their song Lies.
Another girl group that made Daesang history is Girls’ Generations. The K-pop quartet won over 11 Daesangs.
