Ellen Kim [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Ellen Kim began her dance dream with her hometown’s community, starting at Future Shock San Francisco (SF) and making her way to Funkanometry SF. Through her choreography and dance experience within the dance community, she has been blessed to teach around the world for over 10 years. Her work in the industry includes artists such as YG Family, Pharrell, Diplo, Justin Bieber, Beyonce, Zayn, and more. Ellen has also collaborated with brands such as Adidas, appeared in various commercials, TV shows, and movies. Ellen is the lead choreographer for the FLY GRLS, a group of award winning and talented female dancers who perform at prestigious venues and events throughout Los Angeles.
Rina Chae [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Rina is a Korean-New Zealander who has danced in Los Angeles with some of the world’s most renowned artists such as Justin Bieber, Beyonce, & Chris Brown. Her first time encountering Kpop industry was in 2012 dancing for IU, and ever since she has been scouted to work as a choreographer and choreography agent for many Kpop idols. Her recent choreography was for the return of the Angels, AOA – “Bingle Bangle” & ” Super Duper.” Other choreography credits include WJSN (Cosmic Girls), SF9, BoA, & Monsta X. Rina currently resides in New Zealand running her dance company Street Candee.
Kevin Nguyen [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Kevin Nguyen started his dance journey in Temecula, CA on a local high school team and trained in urban dance, ballet, tap, jazz and contemporary dance. In 2013, he joined San Diego’s best dance team, Choreo Cookies, under the direction of fellow k-pop choreographer of Keone Madrid. Kevin has worked with top music artists like Pharrell Williams, BTS, GOT7, B1A4, 2PM, SF9, Dawin, and Paula Abdul. He was a featured dancer in a Google Android commercial and principal dancer in Fox’s, “X Factor.” Most recently, Kevin was a featured dancer and gave on-site creative dance direction in BTS’ “Singularity” music video. As a world renowned choreographer, Kevin has taught dance classes and judged competitions worldwide. Kevin and Dea, as the first “Dance Travel Journalists,” are currently on a mission to share their experiences as traveling choreographers with their online audience across all of their platforms. They hope to continue to inspire people to dance and shine light on the world wide urban dance community.
Miranda Ruth Larsen [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Miranda Ruth Larsen is a PhD candidate at the University of Tokyo and a lecturer at Bunkyo Gakuin University. She studies K-Pop, affect, and fandom, specifically male K-Pop groups and how they operate in Japan. She’s mostly interested in the rookie and ‘rising’ groups that appear in Tokyo’s Koreatown, Shin-Okubo, and have promotional events at Tower Records. Miranda discovered K-Pop during college and annoyed her roommate by blasting MBLAQ every day. She loves Rain, SHINee’s Jonghyun, HISTORY, TEENTOP, and too many others to list.
Liah Yoo [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Liah Yoo is a self-described “Entrepreneur by day, YouTuber by night.” Liah’s focus on skincare has earned her recognition from the industry as a beauty expert. She makes super smart, ultra engaging, informative beauty content on YouTube. In the past, she worked for the K-beauty giant, AmorePacific and now has launched her own skincare line, KraveBeauty to press reset on the beauty industry that’s complicating peoples skincare regime.
Albert Chang of SleightlyMusical [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Albert Chang is a YouTuber and Twitch streamer who utilizes his background in classical music, magic, and film-making to entertain his audiences. On YouTube, he arranges and performs violin covers of songs ranging from K-Pop to film scores. On Twitch, he streams live jam sessions with other musicians, as well as other eclectic activities such as magic tricks, LEGO building, and cooking. When he is not working on online content, he performs at several major live events including BTS’s 2017 Anaheim concert and the League of Legends World’s Championship.
Hana Lee [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Hana is a Korean American kid who loves to upload fashion, beauty and lifestyle videos. She has a dog/son named Pepper, laughs really loud, loves cotton candy, and is so happy to be meeting everyone at KCON!
The First Bite [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
The First Bite is a cover group located in Southern California. They are most known for their participation at KCON and performing in South Korea. Although they show a fierce image on stage, The First Bite is excited to connect with all the fans this year and reach for new opportunities !
Notrealboris [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Notrealboris is a K-Pop cover dancer active on instagram and youtube with 100K+ followers. He tracks his progress in improving and learning all of his favorite dances while interacting with his followers and doing 2x speed challenges. His bias groups are BTS, NCT, and Dreamcatcher. He also likes anime, fitness/health, philosophy, video games, and dystopian novels. Waffles4lyfe :^)
Megan Lee [#KCON18LA Special Guest]
Megan Lee is a Korean-American actress, singer-songwriter based out of Los Angeles. She is best known for her lead role as Sun-Hi in Nickelodeon’s hit TV show Make It Pop. Also her YouTube channel with 43 MM+ views including a cover with Jason Mraz performing ‘Lucky’, released her first K-Pop single ‘8 Dayz’ in Korea reaching the Top 40 charts, continues her music with original songs like ‘Ice Cold’ Thrive Records, ‘Young and Broken’ Spinnin’ Records, ‘Stronger’ & many more. In early 2018, featured on the Emmy Award winning vocal competition, NBC’s The Voice Season 14 on Team Alicia.