The Creator Behind 2025's Biggest Viral Cover Just Released Her First Original Song

In August 2025, Park Da Hye uploaded a cover of Marktub's "Sijak-ui Ai" (Start's Child) to YouTube and watched, somewhat disbelievingly, as it racked up 12.88 million views and climbed to number 6 on Melon's Top 100 — sitting directly above the original version, which was at number 8. It was one of those rare moments where a cover not only matches its source but creates its own cultural conversation around it. For Park Da Hye, a singer who had built her reputation primarily through remake albums and content creation, it was also a turning point. Now she has taken the next logical step: releasing her first original song. The music video for "Your Name" (너의 이름을) is now available on Stone Music Entertainment's official YouTube channel.

"Your Name" is a medium-tempo pop ballad built around acoustic guitar and strings — a sound that is, in many ways, an extension of the warmth that made her cover work resonate. Produced by Hangyeongsu and Loogone (룩원), the song leans into exactly the kind of emotional directness that Park Da Hye does well, without reaching for production complexity that might feel out of character. It is not a reinvention. It is, deliberately, a first chapter.

From Viral Cover to Original Artist: The Park Da Hye Story

Park Da Hye's path to this moment has been nonlinear in the best possible way. She has always identified herself as both a singer and a content creator — the two identities feeding each other in ways that are increasingly common in Korean entertainment but that still relatively few artists manage with her level of authenticity. Her YouTube presence built a fanbase that trusted her musical instincts before she had an original catalog to offer, and that trust, accumulated over years of covers and behind-the-scenes content, is what allowed a remake to chart like a new release last summer.

The "시작의 아이" phenomenon was, in retrospect, an unusual inflection point in Korean music. The original track by Marktub and the cover by Park Da Hye charted simultaneously and in close proximity — a situation that normally only occurs with wildly successful original material and its official remixes. The fact that a cover version achieved this speaks both to the quality of Park Da Hye's performance and to the scale of her existing audience. By the time Marktub invited her to collaborate on an official remake album — and later a duet version — the industry had already taken note.

She appeared on the television talk show "Kang Shim Jang" in February 2026, her first major talk show appearance in roughly eleven years, and introduced herself simply: a singer and content creator. In that description, spoken on national television, was an implicit acknowledgment that both parts of the identity now carry equal weight.

The Sound of "Your Name"

The production on "Your Name" is handled almost entirely by Loogone, who played acoustic and electric guitar, bass, drums, piano, and synthesizer, while co-writing with Hangyeongsu. The arrangement is intimate by design — string arrangements by Sungjin Shin layer over the core instrumental bed in a way that opens the sound without overwhelming it. The result is something that feels like a Sunday morning: specific, unhurried, and quietly affecting.

Park Da Hye's vocal performance on the track draws on the same qualities that made her cover work compelling — a clarity of tone that does not oversell emotion, and a phrasing instinct that lets lyrics breathe rather than forcing them into melodic shapes that might feel more impressive but less honest. This is, in short, the kind of debut original that leaves room for the listener to bring something of themselves to it, which is exactly what the best ballads do.

The music video, directed by Kim Jonghan of 4X4 Studio, complements the song's aesthetic — clean visuals, naturalistic color grading, an attention to the specific kind of longing the song describes rather than a generic emotional shorthand.

What This Moment Means for Creator-Artists in Korea

Park Da Hye's trajectory sits within a broader shift in Korean entertainment, where the line between content creator and professional recording artist has become increasingly permeable. A generation of creators who built large followings on YouTube and social media platforms have found that those audiences translate, sometimes with remarkable force, into music streaming numbers and chart positions. But the transition from covering other people's songs to writing your own requires a different kind of creative commitment — and a willingness to be compared not to the original you covered, but to nothing that came before.

For Park Da Hye, "Your Name" is that step. It is also, notably, not an attempt to replicate the scale or viral momentum of "시작의 아이." The song is quieter, more personal, and more specifically itself — which is, perhaps, the point. An artist establishing what they sound like when the music is entirely their own.

Looking Ahead

Korean music media has noted that "Your Name" arrives at a moment when Park Da Hye's visibility has never been higher. She is actively ranked in the 뮤지션100 (Musician 100), a measure of sustained artist influence across Korean digital platforms, and her social media following continues to grow around both her music content and her creator persona. Whether "Your Name" represents a pivot toward original material as her primary mode, or sits alongside continued remake work, remains to be seen — but the release makes clear that she has ambitions beyond the covers that first brought her to wide attention.

The music video for "Your Name" by Park Da Hye is available on Stone Music Entertainment's YouTube channel. The song is available on all major Korean and international streaming platforms.