An orphaned and destitute boy who lived alone on the streets for ten years is following in the footsteps of Susan Boyle and Paul Potts after his performance on the South Korean version of Britain’s Got Talent reduced the audience to tears.
Millions of internet users have already viewed the performance by 22-year old Choi Sung Bong, who lived “like a mayfly” after fleeing from abuse at his orphanage. The audience tittered when he described himself as a “manual labourer”, dressed in an unfashionable checked shirt and pudding bowl hair cut, but they were overwhelmed by his version Nella Fantasia, originally sung by Sarah Brightman.
Interviewed on stage, Mr Choi described a childhood of acute deprivation. But the producers of the programme have been criticised for editing out of the televised version the information that he later attended a school for the performing arts.
“I was left in the orphanage when I was three, and when I was five I ran away after I got beaten up there,” he said. “I sold gum and energy drinks on the streets. I had that life for about ten years, I was alone. I slept on the streets or in a public toilet for ten years like a mayfly. Singing was the first thing that I liked after that mayfly life. I’m not a good singer, but I just like it.”
After his powerful performance, the silence was finally broken when the lead judge, the actress Song Yun Ah, said tearfully: “I just want to give you a hug.” Her fellow judge, the actress and conductor, Kolleen Park, offered to help him with his singing lessons.
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Interviewed backstage, he added: “When I was young, I had many, many bad experiences – like, I was sold. One day, when I was selling gum in a nightclub ... I was fascinated by the singer who sang on the stage so sincerely. Since then, I liked singing.”
Mr Choi said that he had passed school exams and taken “master classes”, but after investigations by journalists it emerged that the producers had edited out a discussion of his attendance at Daejun Arts High School.
“The fact that he graduated from an arts high school was already known by not only the producers and judges, but by the audience members as well,” the production company said in a statement. “We didn’t feel that it was necessary to include his high school career when people were already so touched with his singing, which is why we cut it out.”