What exactly is Johnny’s Jr?

I'm not familiar with J-pop so all I know about Johnny's Jr. is that it is related to the music industry. I'd appreciate it if someone could fill me in on them. Thanks!

Johnny's Junior is a kind of corporate school that pumps out J-pop men's groups. SMAP, Hikaru Genji, Checkers, those kind of groups were trained since they were young and put together by Johnny's Junior.

Not being a huge J-pop fan, maybe someone else can expand on that:)

If I understand it correctly, I think Checkers were pretty much anti-Johnny's. They were more focused on the "we're no-good rockers from a small town" kinda world when Johnny's hadn't produced any real "bands" like Tokio. But it's really funny, because when you look back at it, Checkers look as Johnny's-like than anything else.^_^

Johnny's Jr. is more or less a jpop group. it belongs to Johnny Entertainment found by Johnny Kitagawa. Johnny's Jr. consist of boys from age 10-20. when one turn 20, he will graduate from junior, probably having his debut as boyband, duo, band... who knows what on mr. kitagawa's head. SMAP, Tokio, Kinky Kids, V6, Arashi, Tackey&Tsubasa (and many more) are groups/duo that graduated from Jr. They sometimes would have some Juniors as background dancers in their stage performances. Juniors sing the songs from those groups. They have their own songs, but not allowed to release em as single. Juniors r also divided into subgroups (Kat-tun, Five, Musical Academy etc). They have a Leader and second-Leader. Hideaki Takizawa a.k.a Tackey (yummy...) was a Leader, too (not to mention another money-maker aside from Takuya Kimura, who has been voted as sexiest man in japan for years)

How old will they take applicants to Johnny's Jimoshi for training? What are some necessary qualities?

It's not always true that one would graduate from Johnny's Jr. at 20, is it? B/c as I know, some members of NewS and KAT-TUN were already over 21 but still stay in Johnny's Jr. b/c other members of their band are still under 20.

It seems as if they have to sing and dance (and not always very well). I rarely see a Johnny's boy playing an instrument. Basically they need some talent and a likeable personality. MANY of them go on to do dramas and hosting shows. You can also see them in lots of commercials. For example, the SMAP guys do lots of TV shows, but also still tour as SMAP.

Many Johnny's artists play an instrument, mostly guitar. Some also play piano, but rarely. For examples, Kinki Kids and Tokio, and some members in NewS and KAT-TUN play guitar. Yamapi can even play piano, but doesn't perform that skill very often.

The thing with Johnny's Jr is that they used to be just the back dancers for older groups then 'Johnny' would form a new group and debut them with CDs and a fanclub. Tackey changed that he raised the profile of the juniors so that they gained more popularity and fans. Now the higher groups in the juniors are more flexible (sometimes crossing members) and they tend to have a 'CD Debut' without having a full fleged debut. Hence KAT-TUN, Kanjni8 and the now-on-shaky-ground NEWS are still techincally Juniors.

Sometimes it gets confusing, but the last fully debuted group was Tackey and Tsubasa.

Hope that helps a bit!

The situation/status of NewS, Kansai 8, and KAT-TUN really confuse me. First of all, I never thought before that a man can be member of two diff bands at the same time! Until I see Ryo and Uchi.....that's really weird. I always wonder why the management did that. If they think Ryo and Uchi are Kansai ppl and so should and must stay in Kansai 8, then why bother to add them to NewS too but then they always absent from NewS's activities?

And then NewS's status....they already debuted but I really don't know if they are "fully" debuted. On Johnny's official site they are still under Jr. But in the magazine Myojo they aren't considered Jr. anymore and so they couldn't compete in the Jr. popularity poll. What bothers me the most is that Ryo the member of NewS could nominate in the poll as a member of Kansai 8, the band which wasn't debuted yet. And NewS always appear in Shonen Club as guest host, not normal host as KAT-TUN are. So is NewS really still Jr. or not? I guess they are not b/c half of the members are still teenagers, and I guess that's one of the reason why they can't work more like KAT-TUN does, considering 5 of the members are still studying in college/high school. I think they can't fully concentrate on their artist career until they all graduate from college....which may be another 4-5 yrs.....

There are some members of Johnny's that are in three and four active groups right now.

Also to get into Johnny's to must apply, they look at the over all individual. They take in applicants as young as nine years old. There is no set age for debuting, as there are some members that are into their 20's that are not parts of groups and have not debuted yet. While you rarely see most of the members playing instruments, most can. The only two full fledged bands in Johnny's would be Tokio and Question where the members play instruments while they perform.

There seems to be levels of debuting at the moment, for example KAT-TUN, NEWS, and Kanjani8 are all still under the Jr information club, but NEWS has had their name on the shop photos for a while- KAT-TUN and Kanjani8 only recently got their names put on...
oh, and only one member of KAT-TUN is still in education. Koki is going into his second year of uni next month...

ok the situation about NEWS(yeah it's with full capitals not only the N and the S)...

well 1 member got caught drinking(dunno wich one it was forgot) but then NEWS got suspended so that's prolly the reason why they couldnt be in the poll for fav. jr.

then about shounen club...there is no regular host...the hosts always get picked and they get to pick out the performances...this month its fujigaya taisuke from KIS-MY-FT2 and ueda tatsuya from KAT-TUN

actually 2 members were suspended for underage drinking: Hiroki Uchi was suspended in July 2005 and Hironori Kusano early this year (Around January or February, I think). It was supposedly because of this that they were put on hiatus and are said to resume working in 2007.

There is a regular host in SC. For example Jimmy Mackey was the main host until he left JE in March. Shortly after, Koyama Keiichiro replaced him as the host. I think the one that always changes is the producer.

i thought people are still a junior member if you still haven't got a cd debut yet....

how can you apply for johnny's. through the internet.. where? is there other ways to apply, it wud be appreciated if there was a link.

First of all, you have to be Japanese, or at least look like you're from Eastern Asia. I would be really surprised if Johnny suddenly decided to have a Western Jr.

Parents often send their young boy child to Johnny's, hoping that he will make it as a star. The boys have to work hard, and there are little time for them to study normally.
Anyways, if the boy does not have a group, or make a debut by the time he turns 21, he's normally kicked out. Then he has to go back to living a "normal" life, although he hasn't been able to study like other children/teenagers.

''Anyways, if the boy does not have a group, or make a debut by the time he turns 21, he's normally kicked out. Then he has to go back to living a ''normal'' life ''

I thought they still were in there. One of Ya-Ya-yah's two boys [and I think he was even the oldest one?] who were kicked out is still backdancing. Though can't be so sure about that, still pretty new in JE -fandom.

''I thought they still were in there. One of Ya-Ya-yah's two boys [and I think he was even the oldest one?] who were kicked out is still backdancing. Though can't be so sure about that, still pretty new in JE -fandom''

Umm...well yah yah yah is 4 members first of all and i don't think any of them got kicked out...they are currently the most popular junior group i think?? But yeah some leave if they get too old and haven't debuted yet, for example Jimmy Mackey i think he left...

Jimmy Mackey was/is a member of Johnny's Jr. and he is 1/2 Japanese and 1/2 American. So, you don't have to be 100% Asian.