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Baekhyun Hwong (born 1997), known professionally as NoSo, is Korean-American non-binary singer-songwriter, guitarist, producer, and composer. [1] NoSo is known for their 2022 debut album, Stay Proud of Me. [2] [3] [4]
NoSo was born Baekhyun Hwong on May 14, 1997, in Chicago, Illinois. [2] [3] [4] They grew up attending a music festival at a venue where musicians such as B. B. King, Bonnie Raitt, and Aretha Franklin performed. [2] They participated in theater classes during their childhood, and performed in productions such as West Side Story . [3]
At the age of 12, NoSo decided to pursue their own musical endeavors.[ citation needed ] They initially took guitar lessons at a local music store, until deciding to learn to play guitar on their own in their family’s basement. [2] [3] When they were 16, NoSo moved to Los Angeles and started to write music. [2] [3] Eventually, NoSo pursued their undergraduate education at the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music, where they studied popular music. [2]
NoSo signed with Partisan Records under the stage name NoSo. [2]
In 2019, NoSo participated in NPR Music's Tiny Desk Concert. [2] [1]
NoSo’s debut album is entitled Stay Proud of Me. [2] [3] NoSo began to lay the groundwork for their debut album in 2017, and eventually recorded the work in their family’s condominium during the COVID-19 quarantine. [3] The guitar-led album was released on July 8, 2022, as a coming-of-age story that encapsulates NoSo’s experiences with their gender and racial identity thus far. [2] [4] [5] The cover art for this album was inspired by Korean records from the 1980s that NoSo’s parents played for them as a baby. [2]
NoSo is a non-binary artist, and they have utilized songwriting as a space in which they can process their ever-evolving gender identity. [1] This is exemplified by the experience NoSo had when writing the opening track of the album, titled “Parasites”, as it was written while they were recovering from gender-affirming top surgery. [2] [5] Several songs on the album express their reflections on their complex and inextricably connected identities as a queer transgender Korean-American who grew up in a predominantly white neighborhood. [2] [1]
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