TAEYEON

TAEYEON

Kim Tae-yeon (born 9 March 1989), most often credited as Taeyeon, is a South Korean singer and actress. She is a member of South Korean girl group Girls' Generation, its subgroup TTS, and SM the Ballad. She has also recorded singles for various television dramas and movies as well as participated in a number of variety shows. Tae-yeon made her solo debut on 8 October 2015 with her first extended play, I.

Tae-yeon debuted as a member of the South Korean girl group Girls' Generation in August 2007. Due to the pressure of being the leader of the group, she experienced sleepwalking for a period of time. Aside from Girls' Generation's activities, Tae-yeon has also made several solo appearances. In 2008, Tae-yeon released two solo songs, "If" for theKBS2's drama Hong Gil Dong and "Can You Hear Me" for MBC's Beethoven Virus. The song "If" became popular on various online music charts, with Hankyung describing Tae-yeon as having "an exceptional voice and sad tone", while "Can You Hear Me" received the YEPP Popularity Award at the 2008 Golden Disk Awards. In a 2014 interview, Tae-yeon mentioned that the latter song was hard to sing, explaining that the introduction had to be delivered as if someone is talking, rather than singing. On the same year, Tae-yeon also had a duet titled "7989" with fellow SMartist, Kangta. It was featured on both Girls' Generation's self-titled album Girls' Generation, and Kangta's Eternity. In April 2008, Tae-yeon became a DJ on MBC Radio's program Kangin Tae-yeon's Chin Chin Radio alongside fellow SM artistSuper Junior's Kangin. After Kangin left the program in April 2009, it was renamed to Tae-yeon's Chin Chin Radio, as Tae-yeon became an independent host and continued on until April 2010. She gained the nickname "DJ Taengoo" while hosting this program.In January 2009, Tae-yeon appeared on the MBC's reality-variety show We Got Married and was featured with comedian Jeong Hyeong-don. They played a couple, portraying what life would be like if they were married. When this news was announced, it caused an uproar among South Korean netizens due to the 11-year age difference between the two. She then participated in the song "S.E.O.U.L." (along with Super Junior and Girls' Generation) as an effort to promote tourism for the city of Seoul in South Korea. In September 2009, Tae-yeon released the song "It's Love", a duet with Sunny for the MBC drama Heading to the Ground.

From February to August 2010, Tae-yeon became a co-host for the KBS2's idol talk show Win Win alongside 2PM's Wooyoung, Choi Hwa-jung, Kim Shin-young, and Kim Seung-woo.On 7 May 2010, she had her musical debut as the main female role in Midnight Sun, which is based on the Japanese novel "Taiyō no uta" by Aya Denkawa.The musical was about Kaoru Amane, a 17-year-old girl, who suffers from Xeroderma pigmentosum, which forbids her from going out during daytime. She keeps her hopes up by writing songs and singing every night at a train station; Tae-yeon received good press for her performance.She also learnt how to play a guitar for her performance. When reflecting on her experience, Tae-yeon shared that she found musicals to be difficult, citing that her weak concentration made it hard for her to act and sing at the same time.Music-wise, Tae-yeon released a duet song, "Like A Star", with her mentor The One, as well as a solo song, "I Love You", for the SBS's drama Athena: Goddess of War.The former song reached number one on Gaon's digital chart and the latter peaked at number two. In 2011, Tae-yeon had a duet, "Different", with Kim Bum-soo; the song reached number two on this chart as well. The two singers met again at a concert two years later for another collaboration "Man and Woman".