Korea's pop singers captivated Singapore on Tuesday at this year's Mnet Asian Music Awards held in the Singapore Indoor Stadium on Tuesday evening (local time).
MAMA is hosted by cable channel Mnet, and the recipients of the awards are chosen based on the votes of fans around the world, as well as input from a panel of experts.
Girls' Generation won the Best Female Group Award and the Artist of the Year Award; Super Junior's "Mr. Simple" won the Best Album of the Year Award; and 2NE1's "I Am the Best" won the Best Song of the Year Award. Ooh La La Session, the winner of this year's Superstar K3 competition, also made an appearance. The band's ailing leader Lim Yoon-taek, who is battling stomach cancer, said, "I was able to go on stage as my health improved. We sang on behalf of the 1.97 million people who came to the Superstar K3 audition."
The 2011 MAMA was a star-studded event, with Korean Wave frontrunners including Girls' Generation, Super Junior and 2NE1 joining U.S. hip hop musician will.i.am, Chinese classical pianist Lang Lang, and Japanese singer Kumi Koda.
Fans completely filled the 10,000 seat-capacity stadium and cheered and danced to the songs of the honored artists. Hundreds of fans gathered around outside of the stadium before the awards ceremony started to watch the stars arrive, with a huge crowd forming in the hotel lobby where the K-pop stars were staying. Read More