All’N goes ‘all in’ on building his own K-pop path

For All’N, “going all in” on music now means betting on more than his ability as an artist.

The Korean American soloist, who debuted in April with “We Up,” describes himself simply as a “violin-driven K-pop soloist.” But behind that description is an unconventional path spanning a US university, China’s idol industry, a stint as a violin-playing DJ and the startup world before he eventually founded his own company, SKS Entertainment, and debuted himself.

“When I chose the name All’N to mean ‘going all in,’ originally, it was about going all in on music and then going all in on building the support system, which is the label,” said All’N during an interview with The Korea Herald.

“But now, I realize it’s far more than that as I’m going all in with my life,” he said, referring to the time, resources and finances he’s putting into building his career independently. “There’s no safety net.”

The decision to put that much behind his own career comes after years of having its direction repeatedly changed by circumstances beyond his control. Before becoming All’N, he had already taken several different paths in pursuit of music — and, at one point, had even been ready to give it up altogether.

From NYU to K-pop

All’N entered New York University on a full scholarship to study music business, following years of playing violin competitively from the age of 9. With his parents encouraging him toward a stable career, he found himself weighing the security of staying in school against another attempt at pursuing music professionally.

The decision came after an executive from a Chinese entertainment company approached him in New York with an opportunity to train in China.

“I decided not to tell my parents and drop everything and go for it,” he recalled. “I literally threw away 90 percent of my stuff, leaving for Beijing with a suitcase, violin, guitar, backpack and laptop.”

What he thought would be a path to joining a band instead led him into idol training. After moving to another agency, he competed on the Chinese survival program “Youth With You,” rising from the bottom of the preliminary rankings to the top A-class tier before being removed from the show after past controversial online messages resurfaced.

He eventually found another route into music as a violin-playing DJ, making his festival debut in Wuhan shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down much of the world.

“As you can imagine, I was in shambles. It was a very dark time for me, but I didn’t give up,” he said. “I gave myself a deadline. If COVID didn’t end by a certain date, then I decided to take that as a sign from God that I was not meant to do music anymore.”

The deadline passed and for the four years after, All’N instead worked at a startup, gaining experience in fundraising, marketing, public relations and product development. What appeared to be a detour from music eventually equipped him with the skills to return to an ambition he had held since childhood: running an entertainment company.

“The door that closed — the same door that I thought was the end of my music journey — just led me to another door,” he said. “(It) gave me the freedom to fully control my creatives, fully control my time and build my childhood dream of building an entertainment company.”

Betting on the violin

Having creative freedom also allowed All’N to build his music around an idea he said many industry professionals initially questioned: making the violin a constant part of his K-pop identity.

“Growing up, I didn’t like being known as ‘the violin guy’ because it felt like that label reduced me to a single skill. It partly pushed me to learn other instruments like the guitar and eventually singing and dancing,” said All’N. “Over time, however, I came to view the instrument less as a limitation than as the starting point for everything that followed.”

“You never want to lose your roots,” the soloist added. “The violin, beyond just sonically and musically, is the foundation of not even All’N but also just who I am as a person.”

On “We Up,” its prominent opening and post-chorus served as a declaration of his identity as a new artist. On his second single “Dream Higher,” released in August, the instrument takes a supporting role to a more personal story.

His upcoming single “Ding,” set for release Oct. 2, takes yet another approach, reconnecting All’N with his past as a violin-playing DJ.

“‘Ding’ is more playful and electronic than ‘Dream Higher,’ as it pairs the violin with aggressive synths and dubstep sounds,” All’N explained. “It’s part of a broader goal of mine to take the violin into genres beyond those listeners might naturally associate with it.”

Whether he gets the opportunity to keep experimenting, however, will depend on whether the independently funded project can sustain itself.

“I have a limited number of songs to give myself the best shot at making this something I can continue doing,” said All’N, acknowledging that he can only finance so many releases before the project needs to become sustainable.

If it works, he hopes to eventually tour, bring violin-driven K-pop to a stadium stage and develop other artists under SKS Entertainment, with an emphasis on giving them room to “bring their own unique experiences into their music.”