Phantom Singer


Phantom Singer is JTBC's music television program which is an audition program aiming to pick a male crossover vocal quartet. The show's season 1 was aired from November 11, 2016, to January 27, 2017, every Friday at 21:00. Season 2 was aired from August 11, 2017, to November 11, 2017, every Friday at 21:00. Season 3 was aired from April 10, 2020, to July 3, 2020, every Friday at 21:00. A special season Phantom Singer All Stars was aired from January 26, 2021, to April 20, 2021. Season 4 was airing from March 10, 2023 to June 2, 2023.

Host

Format

Seasons 1 to 3

Contestants who successfully passed the open audition perform a chosen solo song in front of the panel of six producers and further trimmed down to 32. They proceed to the "1 v 1 duet" stage where contestants are paired up through a random draw and must sing a duet together while competing for a place in the next stage. The producers individually cast their votes on which contestant to keep in each pair. In each duet, the contestant with the lowest number of collective votes are considered for elimination. The producers have a meeting to decide which of the candidates should be kept in the competition and which ones should be eliminated, only announcing the eliminated candidates later; this practice would be repeated for each round of eliminations.
The remaining contestants proceed to the "duet v duet" stage. They are individually allowed to choose their duet partner and are allowed to mix together in a room for thirty minutes before deciding on their duet partner. Each duet will compete against another duet, chosen through a random draw. The panel of producers will individually score each duet out of 100, with 600 being the highest possible score. The panel decides on the candidates for elimination among the losing duets. After that, in preparation for the trio stage, the winning duets will be allowed to pick their third member among those retained contestants who had been in the losing duets. The "trio v trio" stage is conducted in the same way as the "duet v duet" stage and the top 3 winning trios will be allowed the first pick of their fourth member in preparation for the quartet stage. The trios who rank below the top 3 have to reshuffle their line-ups to form new quartets.
The first round of the quartet stage features the quartets performing their selected song and scored by the panel in the same way as the "duet v duet" and "trio v trio" stages. Only the quartet ranked first is allowed to keep all their members while one member from each of the other quartets is eliminated. The remaining contestants are then randomly grouped into quartets for the next round. Similar to the previous round, only the top ranked quartet keeps all their members while the other quartets lose a member each. The remaining twelve contestants write down the contestants they wished to be in a quartet with and undergo an interview with the panel to make their case. The panel makes the final decision based on the vocal range of each contestant and the members' ability to work together as a team.
During the first round of the final stage, the three finalist quartets perform two songs in front of the panel and a live studio audience, accompanied by a live band and chamber orchestra. Points are awarded based on votes from both the audience and the panel of producers. The very last round of the final stage features a much larger studio audience and is televised live. The quartets perform two songs each. The panel does not evaluate the quartets, who are instead awarded points based on text voting and votes from the live studio audience. The winner is decided based on the cumulative points from both rounds.
The scoring method for the "1 v 1" stage was changed in the third season. In that stage, individual producers score each contestant out of 100, with the highest score being 600. Previously, the individual producers only voted for which contestant to keep and the contestant with the fewest votes was immediately a candidate for elimination.

Contestants

In seasons 1 and 2, 32 contestants were selected from the open auditions. Due to the popularity of the first two seasons, places for four more contestants were added in season 3. The majority of the contestants were professional singers or musical actors with work experience while the remaining contestants came from a variety of backgrounds and included university students and corporate employees who were amateur singers. The contestants themselves were responsible for selecting their repertoire and producing their own performances in collaboration with music director Kwon Tae-eun, renowned for his work on JTBC audition program Superband and with K-pop songwriters and producers J. Y. Park and Bang Si-hyuk.

Winning contestants of Season 1

Winning contestants of Season 2

Winning contestants of Season 3

Winning contestants of Season 4

''Phantom Singer All Star''

A twelve-episode All Star special was aired from January to April 2021. It featured the top three quartets from all three seasons. Yoon Sang and Bada, both of whom had been part of the panel of producers, returned and were joined by a "celebrity fan" panel composed of idol singers, actors and comedians. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, there was no audience in the studio; instead the "live audience" joined via live stream and the feed was projected on the screen behind to simulate the presence of a studio audience.
As this special was not a competition, there was no "knock out" format or elimination. Instead, the quartets compete against one another for the trophy and a special prize. They were assigned seven missions to complete and the winner was named "MVP" and got to keep the trophy on their table for the entire next round until relinquishing it to the next winner. The first mission required quartet members themselves to vote for quartets other than their own while the rest counted votes only from the celebrity panel and the live audience. In the final episode, entitled "Phantom Singer Friends", all nine quartets are reshuffled based on similar song preferences and specially-formed quartets performed the selected song together in their own style.
Prior to filming, the quartets draw lots to determine the performance order. The nine celebrity panelists will vote and the quartet will be crowned "All Stars" if they receive a star from each panelist. The final ranking is determined by combining the votes of the celebrity panel, live audience and the other quartets not performing. The winning team is in bold.
#TeamSong
1Hpresso"My Own Hero"
original by Andy Grammer
2Miraclass"Mai"
original by Josh Groban
3RabidAnceMong Geumpo Taryung
4Ingihyunsang"Sinful Passion"
original by A-Studio
5Forte di Quattro"Sound of Winter"
original by Park Hyo-shin
6La Poem"Breathe"
original by Lee Hi
7Forestella"Time in a Bottle"
original by Jim Croce
8Edel Reinklang"A Stray Child"
original by Lena Park
9Letteamor"Story of My Life"
original by One Direction

Each quartet nominates another quartet to go up against. One quartet picks a duel to join, making it a three-way battle. The winning team is in bold and the team with the most votes is named overall MVP.
Each quartet selects a member to represent their team and perform solo. The singer who earns the most number of points wins and earns the right to sit on the throne. If another singer earns more points, the previous winner will be immediately "dethroned". The singer who remains on the throne until the end is the overall MVP.
The seasons face off against one another. The quartets from each season reshuffle into two quartets and two duos and face against the quartets and duos from other seasons. The winning team for each match-up is in bold. The season with the most number of wins is the overall MVP.
Each team is assigned a genre and must perform a song from that particular genre. They draw lots for the team to compete against and one pair is joined by a third team to form a three-way battle. The overall MVP is decided among the winning teams based on the most number of collective votes from the live audience and celebrity panel.
The focus is on Korean-language pop songs and the quartets must choose songs from either the 1980s to 1990s or 2000s and later. The quartet which earns the most number of points wins and earns the right to sit on the thrones. If another quartet earns more points, the previous winner will be immediately "dethroned". The quartet who remains on the throne until the end is the overall MVP. The performance order is determined beforehand through a random draw.
The quartets have a final showdown and put on their last performances. The winning team is in bold and is decided by votes from the live audience and celebrity panel.
#TeamSong
1Forte di Quattro"Dear Name"
original by IU
2RabidAnce"He Lives in You"
original by Lebo M and choir
3La Poem"Writing's on the Wall"
original by Sam Smith
4Forestella"Inner Universe"
original by Origa
5Letteamor"Reality"
original by Richard Sanderson
6Edel Reinklang"An Ordinary Day"
original by g.o.d
7Miraclass"I'll See You Again"
original by Westlife
8Hpresso"Bella ciao"
9Ingihyunsang"Last Night"
original by Chosun Blues

Before filming, the top nine most viewed and trended songs from Phantom Singer are chosen. Each of the 36 participants select the three songs they want to perform and the production team groups them according to their choices and vocal range. There is no winner selected.
#SingersSongSeason
1Go Hoon-jung, You Chae-hoon, Choi Sung-hoon and Paul Kim "Luna"
original by Alessandro Safina		Season 1
2Kwon Seo-kyung, Park Ki-hun, Ko Yeong-yeol and Han Tae-in "Musica"
original by Paolo Meneguzzi		Season 1
3Philip Jung, Kim Min-seok, Kang Hyung-ho and Bae Doo-hoon "Love Poem"
original by IU		Season 3
4Hwang Gun-ha, Jo Hyung-hyun, Cho Min-kyu and Son Tae-jin "Sweet Dreams"
original by Eurythmics		Season 2
5Park Sang-don, Ahn Se-kwon, Kwak Dong-hyun and Kim Hyun-soo "Flower"
original by Lee Seung-hwan		Season 2
6Gil Byeong-min, Lee Choong-joo, Kim Sung-sik and Paek In-tae "La Vita"
original by Shirley Bassey		Season 2
7Yoo Seul-gi, Ko Eun-sung, Julian Kim and Lee Dong-shin "Senza Luce" Season 3
8Ko Woo-rim, Lee Byeo-ri, Jeong Min-seong and Baek Hyung-hoon "Requiem"
original by Three Graces		Season 3
9Park Kang-hyun, John Noh, Park Hyun-soo and Kim Dong-hyun "Il Libro Dell'Amore" Season 1