Secret member Han Sun-hwa has decided to leave the girl group after seven years, the K-pop singer’s agency said Monday. The 24-year-old chose to put behind her girl group career to fully engage herself in acting, the K-pop quartet's agency TS Entertainment said. The singer-actress will enter the free agency market after her existing contract expires on Oct. 13. Han is undecided about her next move, TS Entertainment added. After Han’s departure, TS Entertainment will keep Secret as a trio with ex

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AFP) -- researchers said Monday they have restored the first recording of computer-generated music, created in 1951 on a gigantic contraption built by British genius Alan Turing.The aural artefact, which paved the way for everything from synthesizers to modern electronica, opens with a staunchly conservative tune -- the British national anthem “God Save the King.”Researchers at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch said it showed Turing -- best known as the father

PARIS (AFP) -- The curse of the “The Phantom of the Opera” appears to have struck again with a fire at a Paris theater on Sunday, which is threatening to derail the musical’s debut in France next month.The global sensation composed by Britain’s Andrew Lloyd Webber was due to open at the Mogador theater in Paris on Oct. 13.But a blaze that started under the stage of the Mogador on Sunday morning has thrown the plan into doubt, the theater’s management said in a statement. A fireman was injured br

NEW YORK (AP) -- Beyonce, Alicia Keys and Nicki Minaj, artist-owners of Tidal, will perform at a concert in New York for the streaming service.Tidal announced Wednesday that Lauryn Hill, Common and Robin Thicke will also perform at the Oct. 15 event dubbed “TIDAL X: 1015” at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Pre-sale tickets for Tidal subscribers go on sale Thursday; tickets for the general public will be available Monday. The event, in its second year, will benefit Tidal-supported nonprofits as

NEW YORK (AFP) -- The US music industry Tuesday posted its strongest growth in more than a decade in the first six months of 2016 as streaming subscriptions doubled, but other formats showed weakness.Consumers in the world’s biggest music market had 18.3 million subscriptions to paid services such as Spotify, Apple Music and Tidal in the January-June period, compared with 9.1 million in the same period a year earlier, the Recording Industry Association of America said.The revenue from paid subsc