Singer Lee Seung-Chul revealed the reason he planned and produced "The Scout: The Reborn Star."
ENA's new entertainment program "The Scout: The Reborn Star" (hereafter "The Scout") has been unveiled. The first episode of "The Scout," which aired on the 8th, is a growth music project in which top experts in the music industry directly discover "raw gems whose talents have not yet been fully realized" and present new directions and possibilities to them.
"The Scout," which highlights the process of contestants who once challenged their dreams or honed their skills in their respective positions returning to the stage, promises a harmony born of different genres and experiences that will offer a depth distinct from existing auditions. It is also noteworthy that it is a growth music project that captures the process of top music industry experts finding raw gems who have not been able to demonstrate their talents, suggesting new directions and completing them as global stars through a professional and systematic multi-care system.
Going beyond a simple skill competition, the "developmental format" in which mentors directly discover and nurture participants' potential, the narratives created by mentors who have established themselves in their fields working closely with participants, and a structure that focuses on the degree of change and potential rather than initial skill set this growth itself diverge from conventional audition programs and present a new paradigm.
What raises expectations most is that Lee Seung-Chul, an "audition legend judge" who marks his 40th debut anniversary this year, personally jumped into planning and production. As an ambitious work born after pouring in as much as two years, it was full of anticipation and excitement.
"The Scout" began with Lee Seung-Chul's memory of a broadcast station he witnessed about 20 years ago. "At that time, every day at 4 p.m. the cleaning ladies would throw away brand-new CDs still in their plastic wrapping in the trash. Even as a producer, I felt pained seeing that. How much money and care would have gone into that one album?"
Lee Seung-Chul immediately took action. At the time, he was a regular panelist on a radio program; he had writers randomly bring CDs, invited those people to perform live battles, and decided winners by ARS voting. "We decided winners by listener ARS voting, and the next day the bulletin board went crazy. Fandoms formed and managers were lining up a week later. Wondering if we could give opportunities to friends who had never been on stage became the backbone of 'The Scout.'"
Developing the format from about 20 years ago into a 2026 version was not easy. In particular, it took time to settle the show's distinct "three nos (no eliminations, no backstories, no age)" and to persuade investors and others. "It took two years to convince agencies that didn't understand the format. Some agencies tried to make deals asking how many rounds of the audition we could guarantee. And at first, when we planned it as YouTube content, I wanted to show the public, who don't know the inside story of entertainment companies well, the process by which singers are made. Even if it wouldn't tear down walls, have the best experts come in and raise the quality to debut level, then let the public evaluate the results. That is the real purpose of 'The Scout.'"
As the scale grew, production costs increased, and with more than 50 recruiting writers alone, one can see the passion and sincerity Lee Seung-Chul poured into "The Scout." While there could have been compromises along the way, there was absolutely no compromise. "The compromise I could not tolerate most was 'compromising with myself.' I could not allow slyly changing the program's backbone or structure to suit the broadcaster's tastes, or sacrificing quality and cutting production costs to save money. We pushed through with the original plan to the end. And we recently finished the competition recordings; I was very worried about how it would be realized on the actual stage, but the moment the stage opened and the first recording started, I thought, 'It's done.'"
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