The nation's leading musical awards ceremony, the "Korea Musical Festival - 10th Korea Musical Awards," will be held at the Grand Theater of the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts on January 19 next year.
The Korea Musical Awards are hosted by the Korea Musical Association and sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Arts Council Korea. The Musical Association announced that to mark the 10th anniversary of the awards, various new side events will be organized ahead of the main ceremony in January next year.
Lee Jongkyu, Chairman of the Korea Musical Association, stated, "We have prepared programs that will be remembered meaningfully to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the awards," adding, "'Musical Forum 2025' and 'Musical Criticism Club' have concluded with favorable reviews from audiences and industry professionals, while the 'Musical Class Series' and 'MU:YEAR (Mu-Year) Concert' are also attracting great interest. I hope the main awards ceremony will be an opportunity for the industry and audience to celebrate together and to open the hopeful new year of 2026, which marks the 60th anniversary of Korean musicals."
A total of 21 individuals (or teams) will be awarded across four categories: Production, Acting, Creation, and Special Awards. The grand prize winner will receive 10 million won, while the Best Production Award (for venues with more than 400 seats/less than 400 seats) will each receive 5 million won. Individual awards in the Acting/Creation categories (14 in total) will each receive 1 million won, the Ensemble Award will receive 5 million won, and the Children's & Family Musical Award will receive 2 million won.
The association revealed that the number of entries already exceeds 100, indicating that this year's participation and competition rates are expected to reach the highest levels in the history of the awards.
The selection process for nominees begins with the Nominee Recommendation Committee reviewing and screening the entries to select an initial pool of candidates, up to 10 times the number of final nominees. Then, the preliminary voting panel selects the top five candidates through a two-vote system per person. After the final voting round (one vote per person), the winners will be announced on the day of the awards ceremony.
The voting panel consists of 200 members, with 100 "expert voters" and 100 "audience voters." The expert panel is composed of professionals from six divisions of the Korea Musical Association (theater, stage arts, acting, production, creation, and academia), as well as members of the media and critics. Recruitment for the audience voting panel, which is selected based on the number of performances attended, will take place from the 13th to the 23rd. Further details are available on the awards' official website and social media channels.
Registration for nominees will be open from the 11th to the 27th. Only performances produced directly by member companies of the Korea Musical Association are eligible, and the entries must be original or licensed musicals that opened in Korea as paid performances between December 2, 2024, and December 7, 2025. If a musical opened before this period but was ineligible for entry in the previous year, it may be submitted this year. However, duplicate entries for consecutive years by the same production are prohibited. Nevertheless, if each production is distinct in terms of venue, cast, or performance period, even if staged in consecutive years, they are eligible for entry.
Musical production companies and performance groups wishing to register nominees should review the announcement posted on the association's website and submit the required documents by email. Detailed information regarding the entry process can be found on the Korea Musical Awards website.
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