With 1.5 billion YouTube views, Hong Kong-bound Pentatonix are a cappella’s biggest stars
The hard-working, high-energy a cappella group perform in the city this month. We talk to the band’s bass vocalist, Avi Kaplan
American a cappella group Pentatonix make their Hong Kong debut on September 22 and are set to wow the crowd using nothing but their voices – and some magic rock-star dust. Fans can expect a high-energy show with a big pop-rock concert feel.
Pentatonix got very big, very fast and have YouTube and social media to thank for their rapid rise to fame. Formed in 2011, the five-member group got noticed almost immediately when they won the third season of The Sing-Off on NBC that same year. Their big win earned them US$200,000 and a record contract with Sony Music, but that wasn’t to be their path to success.
After moving to Los Angeles with the record label, there was a shift in management and their new bosses decided there was no place for an a cappella group on the label. Avi Kaplan, who is bass vocalist for the group, describes the initial setback as a blessing in disguise.
“It was the best thing that ever happened to us because we got all the freedom we wanted. We got out of a terrible deal we were in anyway,” says Kaplan.
Determined to retain the fan base from The Sing-Off, the group started releasing videos of cover songs on YouTube. The first video they put out, Moves like Jagger, a Maroon 5 cover, went viral. “It was awesome so we kept doing our videos, kept upping the production value and it kept getting bigger and bigger,” says Kaplan.