I. Intro
SOYEON (소연) is a South Korean artist under Think Entertainment. She was a member of the Korean pop girl group T-ara. She was the leader for T-ara from January 2012 to July 2013, and the first member to join after Jiae and Jiwon left in 2009.
II. Career
III. 2002-2006: SM Entertainment and SNSD
She was originally an SM Entertainment trainee scheduled to debut as a member of Girls' Generation, however she withdrew from the group before they debuted due to the stressful training regime and personal issues. After debuting with T-ara, she revealed on the tvN's show Taxi that at that time she felt the opportunity came so easily and she was in two minds, not fully prepared for the debut. She has also said, “After I left SNSD, I have just resolved and promoted the SNSD members. But after debuting and promoting, I have only realized now that my time spent with T-ara and my time spent with SNSD I was happy with SNSD, but I don’t have regrets on becoming a T-ara member. T-ara is a junior group to SNSD who hopes to become like that. I was the unnie in the group with SNSD, and we all still keep in contact. Our parents are close to each other as well.”
IIII. 2009-2014: The T-ARA Years
Park was the second new member to be added to T-ara after two former members Jiae and Jiwon left the group in mid-2009, starting with their official single debut "Geojitmal" (거짓말, "Lies").
In early 2010, she was rushed to the hospital after complaints of not feeling well while filming for her cameo role in Master of Study. She was then diagnosed with H1N1 while T-ara was still promoting the follow-up track Like The First Time off of their first full-length album, Absolute First Album in the same year she participated in the OSTs for the movie Death Bell 2: Bloody Camp and the SBS drama Coffee House.
Starting in 2011, she was a fixed cast member for KBS's variety show 100 Points Out Of 100 for some time.
Soyeon participated in the musical adaption of T-ara's hit song Roly-Poly, which opened on January 13, 2012, at the Seongnam Arts Center. She had stated prior that it was one of her dreams to stand on stage and act on it. She replaced Hyomin as T-ara's new leader starting on December 7, 2011, for their Lovey-Dovey promotions. She is the fourth leader of T-ara after Eunjung, Boram, and Hyomin. In July 2013, she stepped down as leader and Qri became the fifth leader.
Park appeared in the KBS drama Lovers of Haeundae as Lee Gwan-soon. The drama aired on August 13, 2012.
Soyeon along with Qri and Boram formed a sub-group called QBS in May 2013. The sub-group focused on the Japanese market. They released their debut single titled "Kaze no You ni" (風のように, Like the Wind) on June 26, 2013.
On March 6, 2017 MBK announced that T-ara would be releasing their last album as a six-member group in May, after Boram and Soyeon's contracts ended, and the other members would remain until December 31, 2017. On May 7, MBK Entertainment revealed the group's plans had changed and that the new album's release had been rescheduled to June 2017, with Boram and Soyeon not participating due to the expiry of their contracts. On May 8, it was announced that T-ara's last performance as a six-member group would be in Taiwan concert on May 13.
IIIII. 2020-2021: Career Resurgence
Soyeon would appear on the idol revamp show "Miss Back" which featured female idols who had been mistreated and abused in the industry to give them a second chance. Soyeon ended up leaving after 4 episodes as she felt the other girls on the show needed to be there more as they had been through worse trauma in the industry.
On July 11, 2020, it was announced that Park had signed with Think Entertainment.
