South Korea to send 160-member art troupe to North Korea

Representatives of South and North Koreas have inter-Korean talks at the border truce village of Panmunjom, Tuesday. / Courtesy of Ministry of Unificatio

The two Koreas agreed Tuesday that a 160-member performance troupe from the South will perform twice in Pyongyang in April.

The troupe will visit the North from March 31 to April 3 and perform twice, once each at the East Pyongyang Grand Theatre and the Ryugyong Chung Ju-yung Gymnasium in Pyongyang. They are likely to hold the performances April 1 and 3, but these dates re tentative, according to the Ministry of Unification.

The troupe will include older and younger generation Korean pop musicians, including Cho Yong-pil, Lee Sun-hee, Girls’ Generation’s Seohyun and girl band Red Velvet.

Other known members of the troupe announced Tuesday include Choi Jin-hee, YB (Yoon Do-hyun Band), Baek Ji-young, Choi Jung-in and Ali.

A delegation, led by composer and singer Yoon Sang, visited Tongilgak, a North Korean building at the truce village at Panmunjom near the inter-Korean border for talks with its counterparts Tuesday and later issued a joint statement on details of the performance in Pyongyang.

Hyon Song-wol, head of the Samjiyon Orchestra, who visited the South in February led the North Korean delegation.

The talks began at 10 a.m. and continued for almost four hours.

The two sides discussed details of the troupe’s visit and the North said they would take measures to guarantee the safety and convenience of the performers.

“Our first challenge is to make our performers feel at home just as they perform in the South,” Yoon told reporters. “We have about 10 days to go for the concerts and I will do my best to pull together the best possible show with the members of the troupe.”

He remarked it was not easy to reach an agreement on content as the North did not have many songs on its list, setting political issues aside.

The two agreed that ahead of the concerts, the Seoul would send a team to the North Korean capital from Thursday to Saturday to check the venues and prepare stage equipment and facilities. The advance team will visit Pyongyang via Beijing, the ministry said.

The first concert will mainly feature South Korean artists and the second one is going to be a joint performance.

The troupe is likely to take a West sea route, on a direct flight between Seoul and Pyongyang.

More details will be discussed through document exchanges using the Panmunjom communication channel.

The East Pyongyang Grand Theatre has about 1,500 seats and the Ryugyong Chung Ju-yung Gymnasium, also known as Pyongyang Arena, is a larger venue with 12,000 seats. South Korean singers performed at the Ryugyong Chung Ju-yung Gymnasium in 2003 to celebrate the opening of the venue, and Cho held a solo concert there in 2005.

According to the ministry, the North invited the performance troupe and a taekwondo demonstration team to Pyongyang to reciprocate the visits of North Korean performers to the South to celebrate the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games last month.

Source:koreatimes.co.kr