BoA
권보아- Name
- Kwon Bo-ah
- Born
- 5 November 1986
Is often credited with opening Japan to Korean singers, and was the first Korean artist with two million-selling albums on the Oricon chart.
Their story
Scouted in sixth grade
Kwon Bo-ah went along to an SM audition in 1998 with her older brother, and she was the one who left with an offer. Two years of training later, the album ID; Peace B came out in August 2000. SM had bigger plans than Korea alone. In 2001 she started over in Japan, and she is often credited with opening that market to Korean singers.
Number one in Japan
In March 2002 Listen to My Heart went straight to the top of the Oricon albums chart, the first Korean album to get there. A month later she released No. 1 in Korea, and its title track became the song people still connect with her. Valenti sold over a million copies in Japan, and so did Best of Soul. In 2008 she tried America with "Eat You Up", and her English album BoA became the first by a Korean singer on the Billboard 200.
From idol to producer
Over the years the singer turned into a songwriter. She wrote the title track of Only One in 2012, and Kiss My Lips in 2015 was the first album she wrote and produced entirely herself. She also moved behind the scenes at SM: in 2024 she served as honorary director for the debut of NCT WISH.
Where she is now
For her 25th anniversary she released Crazier, her eleventh studio album and her first in five years. A few months later SM announced that her contract had ended on 31 December 2025, after a quarter of a century together. In March 2026 she launched BApal Entertainment. The name mixes "BoA" with "pal", because the company is meant to be built by BoA and her fans together.