Junior studies music, opera in Korea, NY, IU

Who is junior Jenny Kim?

She’s a girl who loves scarves, who loves to laugh and who listens to every type of musical genre – pop is her guilty pleasure.

But if she’s not wandering around with a scarf on in July or hanging out with her friends or singing along to the radio, she’s in the Jacobs School of Music, belting out her classical music tunes.

Though she’s a singer, Kim says she doesn’t sing in the shower.

Kim has been perfecting her opera skills for almost three years. She’s always loved singing, even as a child growing up in South Korea.

As a vocal performance major, Kim’s concentration is in classical music or opera.

“I fell in love with classical because it’s a different type of feeling,” she said.

She also explained that a person is given the vocal cords they have, and her voice is best suited and expressed through classical music, she said.

“That’s the voice I have,” Kim said, explaining that she is a soprano coloratura.

Her passion for singing came naturally. Her father is known in Korea as a famous actor and her mother is a pianist.

“I guess you can say it runs in the blood,” Kim said.

Her first memory of singing came when she was in second grade competing in a Korean singing competition, where she won first place.

“It makes you feel so alive,” she said. “I could be doing other things, but I’d rather be doing this more than anything else. ... It’s unexplainable.”

When her dad’s fame began to hurt her and her brother, she moved to Long Island, from South Korea with her mother in fifth grade.

It was in Long Island that she began studying classical music. In her junior year of high school, Kim said she studied once a week at the Manhattan School of Music Precollege, working to strengthen her singing skills in classical music.

She knew her vision, she said, and what she wanted to do.

But it’s not just her voice that drew her to classical music. Kim said she loves it because instead of just singing a song, she has to sit down and really work at it.

“People can just pick up and sing a Britney Spears song,” she said. “But classical music isn’t like that.”

The behind the scenes of understanding and learning the music given to her is what Kim likes best.

She also needs to know many languages in order to be able to sing the songs given to her. Besides English and Korean, Kim knows Italian, French and German.

Kim just finished her auditions for some of the upcoming IU operas, but she also belongs to two choruses on campus: U. Choral and U. Singers.

After she graduates, Kim said she wishes that she will be able to perform for as long as she can.

For Kim, performing won’t be a problem. She said she hasn’t ever experienced stage fright.

“It’s weird; I should, but I get excited,” she said. “It’s more of an adrenaline rush for me. I get ecstatic and want to share what I feel.”

Her good friend junior Eric Mowery can understand this feeling. Last year, he and Kim became friends in the chorus for “Suzanna,” and they hit it off.

“Before I knew her, I thought she was a grad student,” Mowery said. “She’s such a people person. I’ve told my friend at home that she is one of the most charismatic people I’ve met.”

Mowery said that both him and Kim share obnoxious laughs, which is how they found each other in the choir.

“You can hear her a mile away,” he said.

Many other students in the Jacobs School work hard, just like Kim, to continue perfecting their skills. Mowery said there is no doubt that everyone who is in the school deserves to be there.

“I can’t wait to see where everyone goes,” he said, reflecting on the school’s talent.

But no matter what she is singing, Kim said she just wants to, at the end of the day, be able to touch people with what she sings.

“I believe people heal through music,” she said. “Convey to the audience what you’re singing about and let the audience glimpse the emotional side of music. As long as I can share the gift of music, I’m happy at the end of the day delivering that to someone.”