Kim Taeyeon, the leader of the top girl group in South Korea, Girls’ Generation, is one of the most popular soloists in South Korea. Being the main vocalist of Girls’ Generation and the sub-unit TaeTiSeo, she made her solo debut on Oct. 8 2015 on M Countdown with her first solo song “I” featuring Verbal Jint and released her first solo EP, “I”. Followed by her Single “Rain” via SM Station, and later continued with her second mini-album, “Why” on Jun. 28, 2016 and her single “11:11” on Nov. 11, 2016. Recently, she released her first full album, “My Voice” on Feb. 28, 2017. She is constantly breaking her own record, all of the “all-kill” on music charts proved her popularity.

Starting off with her first mini album “I” featuring Verbal Jint on her title track, contained six songs, including: “I”, “U R”, “Gemini”, “Stress”, “Farewell”, and “I (instrumental)”. It got a fairly good reaction from the fans as a new soloist with 11 wins in total for her title song “I”. Her album has a dreamy concept where she shot her music video in New Zealand with a baby pink album cover. The perfect scenery with her fairy-like style made the photos very appealing. In terms of the songs, “I” is a pop rock song with the lyrics that she helped to write and intended to speak from Taeyeon’s point of view on being a celebrity and, in the singer’s own words, “about being yourself in a freer way, while moving on from hard and frustrating times”. The singer has also said that she wanted the song to express a “music is my life” feeling. Her album also contained three ballads, which are “U R”, “Gemini”, and “Farewell”. Lastly, it is her upbeat song “stress”, that just makes you want to shake your body! Her mature voice melts with the lyrics and listening to the songs is just like listening to a story; she expressed the feeling really well.

Next, she released her second mini album, “Why”, that has a completely different feeling from her first one. She pre-released the music video of “Starlight” that featured Dean as a big teaser on Jun. 25, 2016, and released her album “Why” three days after the pre-release. The mini album contained seven songs, including “Why”, “Starlight”, “Fashion”, “Hands on Me”, “Up&Down”, “Good Thing”, and “Night”. The concept for this album is very different from her first one, because it is much more colorful and vivacious. She shot her music video here in California, and the CA vibe just made her concept more vivid and free. Unlike her first album, all the photos in her second album are very vibrant and cute. Besides that, her title song is mainly EDM with some R&B that was thrown in for good measure. The pre-released “Starlight” has a slow tempo that combines Dean and Taeyeon’s voice perfectly. Also, “Up&Down” featuring her fellow Girls’ Generation member Hyoyeon has the 60’s jazz melody. Overall her album songs are all really upbeat and groovy.

Finally, it is her first full album “My Voice”, according to the singer, she didn’t have any featuring because she wants to present only her voice to her fans, and that was why she named her album “My Voice”. The album contains 13 songs in total, one song, “ Time to Walk through Memories” cover is a CD-only song. The other 12 are “Fine”, “Cover Up”, “Feel So Fine”, “I Got Love”, “Lonely Night”, “Love in Color”, “Fire”, and “Eraser”. Again, she pre-released the music video of “I Got Love”, which is a pounding, mid-tempo, R&B-inspired tune, and there are some interesting touches inside the main tune itself. It could be a bit odd on the first time listening to this because she never tried this style before, but it got better when you listen to it more. Her full album contained lots of different variety of music, encompassing soul, ballad, dance, and rock numbers. This album is very enjoyable and she expressed a lot of grief and madness in her voice to portray her feeling of breaking up. Soon later the album is release, the singer announced that there will be a deluxe version coming soon with three new songs “Curtain Call”, “I Blame On You”, and “Make Me Love You”.

Last but not least, her singles! She had multiple singles and featuring and was nicknamed the OST Queen. Her single “Rain” started the SM Station program and also won her lots of awards and popularity. The instrumental is angelical with a soft tempo coupled with gentle guitar riffs, light keys from the piano, and lots of soft ad-libbing. Her soft voice highlighted the instrumental and carries the sad imagery throughout the song. The most impressing thing is that she didn’t promote this song on any music program, yet the song won on various music program. Equally important, her another single “11:11” is a downtempo beat with an emphasis on the rhythm rather than multiple sounds, which is mostly guitar. The simple but calming instrument stands out Taeyeon’s voice.

In conclusion, Taeyeon is always breaking her own records in becoming a better singer, and she did it with her hard work and her angelic voice. All of her albums are different yet unique, and the songs suit her voice yet. Her emotions are clearly felt while listening to the songs.