American musician, John Legend, is the favorite international artist this year at the Mnet Asian Music Awards along with other South Korean music stars. Mnet Asian Music Awards, or MAMA for short, is one of South Korea's a major music awards.
American musician, John Legend, is the favorite international artist this year at the Mnet Asian Music Awards along with other South Korean music stars. |
The 35-year-old nine-time Grammy winner gave a performance of his hit single "All of Me" for thousands of fans at one of K-pop's biggest events.
"Thank you so much," Legend said. "It's such a huge honor to be here at the Mnet Asia Music Awards. It's my first time to be here at these awards and I'm so honored to be awarded this special award as an international artist."
"I come from a small town in Ohio and I always dreamed that I could make music for a living, but I never dreamed that it would take me so many places. And I'm so happy that I have fans in Asia that really love my music. Thank you to each of you. Thank you for supporting this music. And as a special thank you I want to do one more song if that's OK with you."
21-year-old South Korean singer IU took the award for best female artist and most popular vocalist for 2014. Taeyang, who started out with K-pop boy band Big Bang, won best male artist.
South Korean-Chinese boyband EXO won album of the year for "Overdose" as well as being named best male group and Asian artists of the year. Sistar won best female group.
The awards show is in its sixth year. K-pop has made its mark not only in Asia but also internationally in recent years with Korean cinema and TV also growing in popularity in the region, a phenomenon known as "Hallyu", or the Korean cultural wave.
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