Melody Day to release second mini album

Korean girl group Melody Day will make a comeback with its second mini-album “Kiss on the Lips,” due to be released on Feb. 15 midnight. The Viewga Entertainment announced the group’s return on Wednesday with a photo shoot, featuring all four members -- Yeoeun, Chahee, Yein and Yoomin -- clad in pink dresses with flowers. Melody Day (Viewga Entertainment)The group was formed in 2012 and officially debuted with the single “Another Parting” in 2014, which was followed by the first mini album “Colo

Feb. 8, 2017

Concert halls call on Japanese engineer to shape sound

TOKYO (AP) -- Behind some of the world’s most reputed concert halls is a Japanese engineer whose finesse in shaping sound is so perfectly unobtrusive that all listeners hear is the music -- in all its subtlety, texture and fullness. Yasuhisa Toyota’s talents are coveted as classical music venues are increasingly designed in “vineyard style,” where audiences surround the stage to hear the performers up close and enjoy an almost-interactive experience, feeling more like a part of the music and bei

Feb. 8, 2017

Bangtan Boys to unveil new songs at concert

South Korean boy group Bangtan Boys, also known by its abbreviated name BTS, is set to reveal new songs at its upcoming concert, its agency said Wednesday. K-pop group Bangtan Boys (Yonhap Photo)According to Big Hit Entertainment, the seven-member act will be showcasing new tracks, including "Not Today" and "Spring Days," at the "2017 BTS Live Trilogy Episode Ⅲ The Wings Tour" at the Gocheok Sky Dome in western Seoul on Feb. 18-19. The new album titled "You Never Walk Alone" is slated to come ou

Feb. 8, 2017

Looking back on the talents of disbanding girl group Spica: Video

K-pop quintet Spica has disbanded, its agency CJ E&M said Monday, after five years of on-and-off activities since their much-anticipated debut in 2012.“It is true that Spica’s members have agreed to go their own ways,” the entertainment company said in a statement. “Their contract period is not yet up, so we are in talks over how to wrap things up.”Promoted as “the younger sister group” to K-pop diva Lee Hyori, the group initially nabbed attention for its raw talents. All five members were power

Feb. 7, 2017

S.M. Entertainment to grow 'Station' into comprehensive content program

S.M. Entertainment, one of the country's three largest K-pop agencies, said Tuesday it will continue "Station," its weekly digital music release program, into season two while expanding it and making it much more comprehensive. (SM Entertainment)Home to big Korean pop acts including Girls' Generation and EXO, S.M. Entertainment launched "Station" in February 2016 as the agency then marked its 20th anniversary.Under "Station," the company released a song each week in which its artists, often toge

Feb. 7, 2017

Original Korean musical to open off-Broadway

“Interview: A New Musical” will open in New York City on Friday, becoming the first original Korean musical, written and composed by Korean artists, to be mounted off-Broadway at the Theatre at St. Clement’s. A preview took place Tuesday.　The show features original music by Huh Soo-hyun and lyrics by Choo Jung-hwa, translated by Bryan Michaels. It premiered at Soo Hyun Jae Theater in Seoul in September last year, later running sold-out shows in Kyoto and Tokyo, Japan.The work’s New York staging

Feb. 7, 2017

HyunA to host free fan meeting in Seoul

K-pop singer HyunA will be hosting a free fan meeting in Seoul to celebrate 10 years in the business.Titled “Fantopia, HyunA Land,” the event will take place on Feb. 17 at Sogang University’s Mary Hall in Mapo-gu, Seoul.A total of 200 tickets, free of charge, are available at HyunA’s official fan cafe, cafe.daum.net/cube-hyuna.HyunA performs at Club Button on Saturday. (Official Facebook)HyunA debuted in 2007 with girl group 4Minute, which rose to fame through hit songs including “Hot Issue” and

Feb. 7, 2017

BTS unveils track list of new album

BTS released the track list for its new album “Wings: You Never Walk Alone” on Tuesday. The news was revealed on their official website and other social media channels. Their new single has 18 songs with four new additions: “Spring days,” “Not today,” “Outro: Wings” and “A supplementary story: you never walk alone.”K-pop group Bangtan Boys (Yonhap Photo)Big Hit Entertainment said the new album is both a follow-up and extended version of BTS’s previous album “Wings,” which was released in October

Feb. 7, 2017

Stolen Van Goghs on show in Naples

NAPLES, Italy (AFP) -- Two Van Gogh masterpieces stolen in Amsterdam in 2002 and recovered last year in Italy will be on show in Naples from Tuesday until Feb. 26.The brief exhibition at the Capodimonte museum has been organized as a thank you to the southern city for the local police‘s role in tracking down the two small but hugely valuable and historically significant oil paintings.The works had gone unheard of from the time they were stolen in a daring raid on the Van Gogh Museum until they t

Feb. 7, 2017

Vibrant Tate show traces of David Hockney’s artistic journey

LONDON (AP) - It’s not often an artist finds himself occupying 12 rooms of London’s leading museum of British art and the front page of populist tabloid The Sun. But David Hockney is unique. For curators of a major retrospective opening this week at Tate Britain, Hockney is an innovator whose 60-year career has taken in sketching, painting, printmaking, photography and digital iPad experiments. His depictions of sun-dappled Los Angeles swimming pools and wooded Yorkshire hills are among the best

Feb. 7, 2017

Apple Music gives nod to Zion.T and G-Dragon’s ‘Complex’

Singer-producer Zion.T’s song “Complex,” from his recent album “OO,” was selected among the “Best of the Week” by the US’ Apple Music on Sunday.“Complex,” a moody tune that sings about personal insecurities, features rapper-producer G-Dragon of K-pop group Big Bang.Every week, the “Best of the Week” list selects new tracks released by artists from around the world. Also listed among the 50 songs were Eminem’s “No Favors” and Imagine Dragon’s “Believer.”  Album cover image of Zion.T’s new album “

Feb. 6, 2017

Lady Gaga delivers a show big on flash and inclusiveness

NEW YORK (AP) - Lady Gaga dropped from the top of Houston’s NRG Stadium to open her halftime show and dropped the mic at the end, offering a program that delivered high-energy hits and an inclusive theme.With the nation on edge politically, the NFL had little taste for a show that would ruffle feathers, as Beyonce did in some circles last year with the Black Power messaging of “Formation.” Gaga was patriotic from the start, opening with snippets of “God Bless America” and “This Land is Your Land

Feb. 6, 2017

Dutch city unveils ‘largest ever Mondrian painting’

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AFP) -- Dutch officials unveiled Friday what they called “the largest Mondrian painting in the world” to celebrate the Netherlands’ best-known abstract artist, who helped found an influential art movement a century ago.The replica “painting” made from thin stick-on plastic sheets features Piet Mondrian’s famous design of straight black lines and striking red, yellow and blue blocks and has been displayed on the sides of the city hall in The Hague. “The Hague’s city counci

Feb. 6, 2017

Rodin Museum fetes sculptor with passion-themed installation

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Auguste Rodin’s sensuous piece “The Kiss” will, fittingly, form the core of an installation at Philadelphia’s Rodin Museum centered on the theme of passion to mark the 100th anniversary of the French sculptor’s death.“The Kiss,” in marble, portrays a couple forever locked in an amorous embrace. The new installation’s marble, bronze and plaster casts feature pairings including men and women, mothers and children, a woman clutching a dead lover -- and others that are playful, a

Feb. 6, 2017

Art star Anish Kapoor wins $1m Jewish prize

JERUSALEM (AFP) - Sculptor Sir Anish Kapoor was named on Monday as this year's winner of the million-dollar Genesis Prize, awarded for commitment to Israel and Judaism, organizers said.British-Indian Kapoor “is one of the most influential and innovative artists of his generation,” they said in a statement.He won the prestigious Turner Prize in 1991 and was knighted in 2013. “Kapoor will use this award, and the global platform provided by the Genesis Prize, to raise awareness of the plight of ref

Feb. 6, 2017

Black Sabbath say last rites on touring in homecoming

LONDON (AFP) - Black Sabbath, the pioneers of heavy metal, ended their last-ever tour with a final concert in Birmingham, their home town where it all began nearly 50 years ago.The godfathers of the genre bowed out on Saturday with a farewell show at the 16,000-capacity National Exhibition Centre Arena in the central English city.Guitarist Tony Iommi, singer Ozzy Osbourne, bass guitarist Geezer Butler and drummer Bill Ward got together in 1968 and created a sound filled with the brooding menace

Feb. 6, 2017

Mozart meets his match: Stage hit ‘Amadeus’ comes to screen

LONDON (AP) -- For a play that makes audience members contemplate their own mediocrity, “Amadeus” is quite the crowd-pleaser.Britain’s National Theatre has a sold-out hit with a revival of Peter Shaffer’s play about bad-boy genius Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his jealous rival Antonio Salieri, composer to the 18th-century Viennese court.The production, which mixes actors, opera singers and a 20-piece onstage orchestra, is being broadcast in movie theaters around the world Thursday as part of the

Feb. 5, 2017