Pianist Lim, violinist Shin to play Saraste, Brahms and Ravel togetherPianist Lim Dong-hyek and violinist Shin Hyun-su, the only two Koreans to have topped the prestigious Long-Thibaud International Competition, will stage a flamboyant duo recital as part of the upcoming classical chamber music summer event, Ditto Festival.The triennial competition aims to discover talents in piano and violin and

Performance June 16, 2011

Donga TV held a charity classical music concert for multicultural families at the Center for Gangnam-gu Residents in southern Seoul on Monday. The second “Classical Music Night with Love and Sharing” concert aimed at promoting the School of Global Sarang, a new international elementary school established in March in Oryu-dong for multilingual and multicultural education. It is open to children fro

Performance June 15, 2011

Indie pop duo to play Olympic Hall on July 16While idol group-centered K-pop has been heavily covered by the media, the Korean indie music scene has received relatively little attention. Seeking diversity of Korean music, The Korea Herald is starting a series of interview articles shedding light on the Korean indie music scene. ― Ed.The 1990s is often called “golden age of Korean pop” because ther

Performance June 15, 2011

‘Madame Butterfly’ and ‘Gianni Schicchi’ to be staged at Sejong CenterTwo Puccini operas, quite different in scale and target audience, are expected to amuse both opera lovers and newcomers this summer.For the first time in 21 years, the Korea Opera Group will present “Madame Butterfly,” one of the three best-known Puccini operas, from June 24-26 at the Grand Theater of the Sejong Center for the P

Performance June 14, 2011

English speakers favor Super Junior, French and Spanish are Big Bang fansKorean pop, or K-pop, is driving the Korean Wave abroad and Asian women in their 20s make up the majority of overseas hallyu fans, a survey found on Monday.The Korea Tourism Organization conducted the online hallyu survey on 12,085 non-Korean visitors from 102 countries to its website (www.visitkorea.or.kr) from May 11 to May

June 13, 2011

Classical Music“2011 Ditto Festival”: Male-chamber ensemble Ditto, led by violist Richard Yongjae O’Neill, is to hold its annual summer festival from June 22-July 3 at the Seoul Arts Center’s Concert Hall and Hoam Art Hall. Highlights of the festival will include Ditto and Parker Quartet’s duo recital on June 25 at the SAC at 2 p.m. The duo program will feature Debbusy’s String Quartet in g minor

Performance June 10, 2011

Lila Downs“En Paris o Live Á Fip”Music CompassBorn to a Mexican-Indian mother and Scottish-American father in the U.S., singer-songwriter Lila Downs is quite mysterious in that she taps into both Mexican traditional music and pop. The 42-year-old mestizo’s latest album “En Paris o Live Á Fip” collects her songs performed for France’s FIP radio station in 2009. Songs like “La Cucarach” and “La Llor

Performance June 10, 2011

The Traffic Broadcasting System, which operates the all-English radio station TBS eFM here, celebrates its 21st anniversary on Friday. The broadcaster’s chief said the media company will keep its identity, which is to put public interest before ratings.The Seoul City-run media company operates five channels ― TBS at 95.1 FM in Korean, TBS eFM on 101.3 FM in English, Chinese and Japanese broadcasts

People June 9, 2011

Baek Cheong-gang, winner of the MBC’s star search program “Great Talent,” kept his promise that he would donate the half of his prize money to a welfare center to help underprivileged people. The broadcaster said on Wednesday that Baek visited Sangrok Orphanage in Seoul and donated 50 million won worth of cash, clothes and socks.Baek and MBC discussed which organization would be the beneficiary, M

June 8, 2011

The Visit Korea Year Committee said it has kicked off the 2011 K-pop cover dance festival at www.coverdance.org. The committee will conduct an online preliminary competition until July 24. Applicants around the world can submit their K-pop cover dance video to the webpage. In countries where the registered videos get the most hits and “recommended” buttons clicks, the committee will run a second r

Performance June 8, 2011

The highlights of two upcoming K-pop concerts in Paris will be broadcast on YouTube and Facebook. SM Entertainment plans to hold the “SM Town World Tour in Paris” concerts on June 10 and June 11 at Le Zenith de Paris as part of the 2010-2012 Visit Korea Year(s), the country’s largest entertainment agency said. The company added the June 11 show after hundreds of French K-pop fans in May rallied in

Performance June 8, 2011

Country aims to increase accommodation in Manila by 50 percent in 3 yearsThe Philippines’ recent policy to spur competition among international airlines will lead to a general reduction of tourism costs there, the country’s tourism secretary said.“Our new President (Benigno Aquino III) introduced an ‘open skies’ policy to promote competition among airlines by allowing more airlines to come in so t

Travel June 5, 2011

Classical Music“Seoul Philharmonic Explorer Series II”: French conductor Ludovic Morlot and violinist Kang Hae-sun will collaborate with The Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra for its “Explorer Series II” on Ibert, Manoury and Mussorgsky on June 23 at 8 p.m. at the Seoul Arts Center’s Concert Hall. The series aims to broaden the repertoire of the Korean classical music scene by exploring less touched up

Performance June 3, 2011