In a July 2016 Gallup Korea survey on "songs that come to mind in summer," the overwhelming No. 1 was "Let's Go to the Beach" by the Key Boys. The Key Boys billed themselves as "the Beatles of Korea" and were the country's first group-sound band, and their "Let's Go to the Beach" never failed to stir the entire nation whenever the summer vacation season arrived. Since DJ DOC reinterpreted it as an upbeat dance track in 1997, it has also been remade by Dickpunks, the Yook Joong-wan Band, and SWAY.
Who created this beloved song sung by the whole nation? The lyricist and composer was Lee Cheol, a Korean resident of Japan, and there is a story behind it. In 1968, at the "Asia Group Sound Festival" held at the Seoul Citizens' Hall, the rock band "The Astro Jet," led by Lee Cheol, a Korean resident of Japan, took part and sought to introduce to his homeland "Hamabe e Iko" (浜辺へ行こう, "Let's Go to the Beach"), which had been released earlier in 1966. At the time, however, Japanese-language songs could not be performed on Korean stages. Lee Cheol then asked his older brother Lee Geon to find someone to translate the song's lyrics into Korean. Lee Geon asked the novelist Lee Ho-cheol to translate and adapt it. Later, when the Key Boys asked Lee Cheol for permission to sing "Let's Go to the Beach," he granted it.
The lyrics captured the flavor of the Korean language well, and the melody was arranged differently from the original, so it should be called an adaptation. Above all, while it did not do well in Japan at the time, it drew tremendous popularity in Korea and remains a song people enjoy listening to and singing today. This is the power of the lyrics and the arrangement. It was reborn as a song that refined and emotionally resonant. It is an exemplary case of Korean adaptation and remaking. Moreover, the original was itself a creative work born of Korean sentiment.
