Rural universities fail to attract Korea's biggest stars for festivals

Members of K-pop group IVE pose during a concert at Yonsei University’s spring festival in western Seoul last Saturday. [IVE’S INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT]

Park Ji-hwan, 25, a student at Yonsei University in Seoul, was ecstatic when he saw the lineup for his university festival this month: aespa, Le Sserafim and IVE, just to name a few. For Park, seeing the hottest K-pop groups perform in person last Saturday was more than just a fun experience.

“When the crowd sees a band they all know, they sing along and go wild,” said Park. “The more popular the band, the more I think students feel pride in their university.”

Across the country, universities are hosting their spring festivals, allowing students to drink and party on campus, often to live performances by K-pop artists, which are considered the highlight of the annual events.

The list of performers usually circulates online in the weeks prior to each festival, drawing envy from students at other universities when they’re packed with the hottest stars.

The shows are funded through the school budget and can cost tens of millions of won per singer or band depending on their popularity — generally too much for rural universities to afford, which is where the discrepancy between universities in Seoul arises.

Even as some students criticize universities for splurging on spring festivals, popular ones like Yonsei University’s draws massive crowds every year.

For years, universities outside the Seoul metropolitan area of Seoul, Incheon and Gyeonggi have been struggling with sharp declines in student applications amid the country’s dipping fertility rate, leading to shrinking revenues.

But even when rural universities are willing to go beyond their budgets to hire A-list celebrities, some say they’re still finding it hard to close deals because the singers don’t want to travel long distances unless they’re paid double or triple their appearance fee.

“Talent agencies are reluctant to send their artists anywhere past Daejeon because for every show they can throw in a rural area, they can throw three shows in Seoul,” said a spokesperson for a booking agency that mediates between universities and entertainment agencies for school festivals.

“It’s only fair that the same artist be paid 15 million won ($11,300) to perform outside the Seoul metropolitan area if they’re paid 5 million won in the capital.”

Despite the financial burden, some administrators at universities in the countryside say they still bend over backward to invite the trendiest K-pop acts because their appearance helps boost the school's reputation, especially when nearby residents show up on campus to see the concert.

“Here in rural areas, students have very few opportunities to enjoy mainstream culture,” said an official at a private university outside greater Seoul. “We have no choice but to pay higher costs than Seoul-based universities to invite celebrities.”

A college student in a rural city who wished to be identified only as Kim said the lineup hugely affects students’ “sense of belonging” to their universities because it shows how much “impact” the school has in society.

For similar reasons, another official at a private university in a rural area said her university spent 120 million won on hiring six artists, including a rapper and a ballad singer, to perform at the school festival this year.

BY NAM YOON-SEO, LEE SUNG-EUN [lee.sungeun@joongang.co.kr]