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<\/p>\nAs one of the world’s largest music festivals gets underway this weekend, a pop group from the Philippines will make history.<\/p>\n
BINI will become the first Filipino girl group to perform at Coachella in California. Other solo Filipino artists have performed at past festivals.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Owen Nebril, a BINI fan from Melbourne, said the gig proved the group could appeal to international audiences.<\/p>\n
“They’re pretty talented,” Mr Nebril said.<\/p>\n
“I think it will showcase how good Filipinos are in terms of singing and entertaining people, not only in the Philippines, but throughout the world.”<\/p>\n
BINI, whose name comes from the Tagalog word ‘Binibini’ \u2014 meaning young woman \u2014 is a P-pop group.<\/p>\n
P-pop stands for Pinoy pop, a Filipino genre of music that is growing in global popularity.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It draws on influences from K-pop from South Korea, J-pop from Japan, and idol culture, where performers are trained and marketed to connect with fans.<\/p>\n
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BINI has cultivated a large fan community after they debuted in 2021. (Supplied: BINI)<\/p>\n
Philippine music journalist Kara Angan said BINI performing at Coachella was a “really big deal”, as it introduced Filipino pop music to a global audience.<\/p>\n
“[It brings] Filipino culture and Filipino music to an audience that probably might not … have chosen to listen [to BINI] in the first place,” Angan said.<\/p>\n
BINI are not the only P-pop artists making music festival history.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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SB19 will perform at the Lollapalooza festival in the US in July. (Supplied: Cathy Gonzales)<\/p>\n
Filipino-British singer-songwriter Beabadoobee will perform at Lollapalooza in the US in July, while SB19 will be the first Filipino group to appear at the same event.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Angan said the rise of these groups, who sing in Tagalog, showed language was no longer a barrier for listeners.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“You don’t just have the songs themselves, but there’s the dance, the choreography, the live experience is different,” she said.<\/p>\n
“You have idols who interact with their audiences.<\/p>\n
“[They’re the] whole package.”<\/p>\n
Idol culture is prominent in the music industry in Japan and South Korea.<\/p>\n
In the Philippines, major media network ABS-CBN runs one of the televised idol training programs called Star Hunt Academy.<\/p>\n
The girls, who are now known as BINI, trained on that show in 2019.<\/p>\n
They were mentored by local and South Korean coaches on the televised talent development program before signing with their record label.<\/p>\n
Angan said after their debut, BINI cultivated a large fan community and made people feel like they were “part of something”.<\/p>\n
She said fans around the world, regardless of their nationality, were able to connect over their mutual interest in the band.<\/p>\n
P-pop goes ‘glocal’<\/p>\n
The sold-out performances of SB19’s concert in Sydney and Melbourne last year demonstrated the strong P-pop fan base in Australia.<\/p>\n
Mike Venezuela, the promoter for SB19’s Australian performances, said about 4,800 concert-goers attended the two shows.<\/p>\n
However, this is still a fraction of the tens and thousands of fans who attended K-pop group Blackpink’s concert in 2023.<\/p>\n
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Melanie at the SB19 concert in Sydney. (Supplied: Melanie)<\/p>\n
Melanie, a K-pop fan who is now also a P-pop fan, attended the Sydney show and thought SB19 were “highly-produced” and had “an amazing stage presence”.<\/p>\n
She said she first came across the group in 2024.<\/p>\n
“I remember \u2026 being like, ‘Oh my God, who is this group? I need more.”<\/p>\n
Melanie said P-pop music bore similarities to K-pop, but was influenced by traditional Filipino instruments.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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SB19 performed in Melbourne in 2025 to a crowd of thousands. (Supplied: Cathy Gonzales)<\/p>\n
P-pop first rose in prominence in 2020, when the Philippine music industry debuted its own idol groups.<\/p>\n
Those groups cultivated huge fan bases thanks to viral dance videos and live performances.<\/p>\n
University of Austin music assistant professor James Gabrillo said that in the past, many groups in the Philippines debuted through a “rigid training system” that was televised on reality shows.<\/p>\n
Many of those shows, like The Voice, were no longer airing, and the system had now evolved into something similar to South Korea’s model, he said.<\/p>\n
“It has become more structured. It has become more intense,” Dr Gabrillo said.<\/p>\n
“You get a mix, still, of idol-style training layered on top of older OPM [Original Pilipino Music] values, like strong vocal delivery, emotional connection, and mass appeal.”<\/p>\n
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BINI came to Australia in 2023 to perform and shoot promotional videos. (Supplied: BINI\/YouTube)<\/p>\n
Dr Gabrillo said P-pop groups had now found their niche and were becoming “glocal”, both global and local.<\/p>\n
“Their branding is so attractive in the way that it’s not just local,” Dr Gabrillo said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“There’s something so globally appealing about it, but there’s also something so distinctly Filipino with the way they present themselves.”<\/p>\n
While there is debate about whether P-pop should be its own genre, Dr Gabrillo believes P-pop still falls under Original Pilipino Music (OPM).\u00a0<\/p>\n
OPM originally referred to pop songs, particularly ballads, that were popular in the Philippines in the 70s.<\/p>\n
But, Professor Gabrillo said, now it was a “umbrella” term that described popular music produced or performed by Filipino artists, covering a range of genres from rock to hip-hop.<\/p>\n