LE SSERAFIM‘s Kazuha‘s story is one of the most interesting in all of K-Pop. She trained as a ballerina in the Netherlands and worked hard all her life to become a professional dancer.
Instead, she suddenly changed directions and made her debut in a new girl group from HYBE and Source Music in a completely different country.
She had to deal with a lot of problems, like the language barrier and the pressure to improve her singing.
In a new interview with Weverse Magazine, a key employee from Source Music talked more about the problems Kazuha had to deal with behind the scenes.
The head of the Performance Directing Team, Park So Yeon, said that she had an unexpected challenge ahead of her: dancing.
Even though the Japanese member had been moving her body for hours every day since she was a child, the kind of dancing she had to learn was very different from what she was used to.
Her new normal was a mix of hip hop, jazz, krumping, and a few other dances. They were much more casual and fun than the elegance she was expected to show as a ballerina.
Park So Yeon said, “After 15 years of ballet, the straight lines are built into her, and it must have been very hard for her to break out of them all at once.”
The fact that Kazuha used to dance ballet turned out to be a worry instead of an advantage. Since she had never done this kind of choreography before, the few months she had to train before her debut were even more stressful.
Park So Yeon said, “Kazuha‘s time as a trainee was pretty short, and her debut with LE SSERAFIM was the first time she tried K-pop choreography.“
After she nailed the “FEARLESS” dance, the “ANTIFRAGILE” dance was an even bigger challenge. It was harder than the other performances she had done.
Because of this, the director of Source Music challenged her to take on a part in the song that would have been hard for a ballerina to do.
Park So Yeon came to the conclusion that Kazuha should shout “I’ll climb higher” as she moves forward to get the audience excited.
She did better than expected, which wasn’t a surprise, and was said to have “practiced nonstop and done it perfectly.”
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