One of the biggest current trends in the South Korean entertainment community involves celebrities and entertainment agencies taking a stab at the food and beverage scene.

Many Korean celebs have invested in their own cafes or dining establishments, such as Grill5taco owned by Super Junior’s Dong-hae, JYJ Junsu’s Misarang Imshil Cheese Pizza and G-Dragon’s Cafe Monstant Aewol on Jejudo Island. The country’s leading K-pop agencies are also jumping on the bandwagon, rapidly penetrating the food market with their eyes set on successfully pioneering a chain of Korean cuisine eateries outside the peninsula.

Following the unveiling of its SMTOWN@Coex Artium – an entertainment hub complex in the centre of Gangnam that features a merchandise store, theater, studio and a cafe – last year, SM Entertainment forged ahead with its third attempt at the restaurant business by opening the five-story multi-complex restaurant SMT Seoul earlier in January in the posh neighbourhood of Cheongdam-dong, Seoul.

The eatery not only offers diners a variety of fusion food options such as Seoul-style tapas, as well as other Asian dishes, it also oozes K-pop goodness – featuring hologram projections of the agency’s artists – making it the ultimate dining option for die-hard fans or curious patrons.

According to officials at SM, the agency has tentative plans to launch the restaurant franchise overseas, with aims of opening an SMT Tokyo and an SMT LA sometime later this year.

“Creating a global establishment has always been the plan for our restaurant ventures from the start,” said a representative of SM Entertainment. “The concept for SMT Seoul is to meet our aims for having our style of Korean food being tasted at an international level.”

Despite its sky-high ambitions, the restaurant marks SM’s third attempt at penetrating the food market. In 2008, the company opened the Korean restaurant e-table, but eventually had to close its doors in 2011. The following year SM attempted to open the Chi Mc pub in collaboration with the local hamburger joint Kraze, but the project ended up going bust at the last minute.

“Having run a number of test-runs in the restaurant business in the past, we now feel like we possess the know-how (with the SMT franchise),” the SM spokesperson added.

In a media presentation earlier this year, SM founder Lee Soo-man announced his initiatives to continue expanding the company’s celebrity-based merchandise stores and international projects.

“SM has now come of age, and is looking forward to taking another leap. We will accomplish the world’s greatest ‘blooming of culture,'” Lee said during his presentation.

Rivaling SM is another top dog in the Korean entertainment industry – Yang Hyun-suk of YG Entertainment.

No stranger to appearing on the small screen, the cafeteria at YG’s company headquarters has garnered much public attention in the past. Audience members have gotten quick glimpses of the agency’s notoriously tasty, in-house cafeteria food through various K-pop reality shows, with Yang famously having stated, “Our families must eat well to work well.”

In 2004, the company established a dining subsidiary YG Foods which opened its first Korean-style pub Samgeori Pocha in 2004. Noh Hee-young, former brand executive of mega-conglomerate retail giant CJ Group, was later appointed to head YG Foods leading to the unveiling of the agencies new Korean barbecue franchise – Samgeori Butchers.

Last June, the agency opened the first Samgeori Butchers in Hongdae. In less than a year, the company has already launched two branches of “YG Republique” – which feature YG’s Samgeori Butchers, K Pub and 3 Birds cafe – in the bustling tourist hotspots of Myeong-dong and the IFC Mall in Yeouido.

“YG Republique is not just a brand that is launching in Korea. We are currently preparing to expand our brand into the overseas market,” said a spokesperson at YG Foods, adding that the company plans on opening a YG Republique complex in ShowDC Mall in Bangkok in June.

Later this year YG expects to open its Republique dining complexes in Orange County, California and China.

Along with his fellow agency rivals, mega K-pop producer and founder of JYP Entertainment Park Jin-young has also taken a stab at the restaurant scene, with hopes of global expansion. However this was met with little success.

In 2012, JYP Entertainment opened a chic, upscale Korean barbeque joint, Kristalbelli, near Korea Town in downtown Manhattan. Park had announced that he had invented the restaurant’s signature grill, as well as created his own grilling manual after visiting numerous barbecue establishments in his home country.

Banking on its success, JYP Entertainment had announced its plan to open branches in cities worldwide including Los Angeles, Tokyo and Beijing. However, the agency ended up selling off the restaurant and was unable to expand the brand.

“I burn with revenge and false hopes. In these falsehoods, I die in darkness. Darkness, darkness, darkness!” she screams, her eyes closed and her head swaying to the loud, rambunctious music reverberating through the tiny studio in Ujungberung, a town in Bandung, capital of West Java. Dubbed Kampung Metal, Ujungberung is the so-called birthplace of local metal music.

Unlike two decades ago, headscarf-wearing women like Asri in metal bands are no longer frowned upon. Now, a number of female musicians donning the “symbol of Islam” are even rocking their electric guitars and druon social media.

Metal music, with its dark lyrics and themes of death and doom, is very much alive – and thriving even – in Muslim-majority Indonesia. This is despite growing Islamic conservatism in the country, where rising intolerance has led to violence between mainstream Musliand non-Muslias well as religious minorities, including the Shi’ite and Ahmadiyah sects.

The music genre’s growing acceptance in the community is largely attributed to musicians tweaking lyrics to suit local taste and decorum, a supportive metal community, as well as heightened awareness created by the Internet that allows bands to expand their fan base in the vast archipelagic nation.

Asri, a mother of two who has a day job as a kindergarten teacher, is a vocalist with Gugat, or Threat in Indonesian, a hardcore metal band considered to be one of the country’s pioneers in the genre.

“My parents protested at first and told me to quit. They said metal music is scary and so dark. But I only like the music. I don’t smoke, drink alcohol or take drugs,” she told The Straits Times.

“When I wore the headscarf two years after joining the band, fans told me, ’If you wish to pray, do it at home, not here’. But people are more accepting of us now.”

Now hailed as the “new mainstream”, metal music has captivated hundreds of thousands of fans, from the pluralistic city of Bandung, where metal is said to have taken root in the 1990s, to deeply religious Aceh province, where a concert last month saw teenage girls in headscarves head-banging along with boys.

Thousands of local bands hold concerts every year, drawing huge crowds of 1,000 to 45,000 each time. A concert by American band Metallica, held in Jakarta in 2013, attracted some 60,000 fans.

The genre’s unlikely top supporter is none other than President Joko Widodo, who swears by seriously heavy Metallica, Napalm Death and Led Zeppelin “because rock is my passion”, he had told the media.

The soft-spoken and mild-mannered man had thrilled metalheads around the world with photos of himself at metal concerts wearing his Lamb of God T-shirt and leather jacket and gamely flashing the sign of the horns, a hand gesture common within heavy metal culture featuring the index finger and the pinkie extended from the fist.

Music expert Bens Leo said metal music in Indonesia has evolved in the last decade, with more bands espousing nationalistic and non-destructive messages.

“The lyrics are not critical in a negative way. Nowadays, the musicians advocate the spirit of nationalism, and sing about how to protect women and the environment. Metal music reflects current social issues and serves to unite people,” he said.

Beyond social issues, however, metal appears also to be entering the religious realm.

Muslim metal?

“Ustad Metal”, or the metal cleric, is what Alfian Muhammad Tajul Arifin, 30, is known as.

In the day, he teaches the Quran at a Muslim boarding school known as a pesantren in the West Java city of Garut. On Friday nights, he literally lets his hair down, swinging the long strands around as he jawith not one but two death metal bands called Jiwa, which means Soul in Indonesian, and Tormentor.

“I don’t see anything wrong. Conflicts stem from the lack of understanding. It’s like saying those people in pesantren must be fanatics and those in metal bands must be baddies. I live in both worlds and I can say it’s all untrue,” he said.

However, he draws the line at preaching Islam through his music.

“It’s inappropriate. Metal music has negative connotations, so why use it to spread Islam? And why preach by shouting? What if your messages are wrong? Well, let’s leave the religious teachings to the clerics,” he added.

His view, however, is not shared by an underground “Metal Satu Jari” or “one-fingered metal” movement, which burst onto the scene six years ago. With a single raised index finger to symbolise One God, these Muslim bands spread religious teachings through their music.

During concerts, some shout verses from the Quran, while others abruptly stop to perform mass prayers with their fans when the azan, or call for prayer, rings out. A few post provocative music videos online showing them with firearms.

Mohamed Rohman, 38, vocalist with the band Jasad, or Corpse, said he was criticised by a Muslim band for burning incense, a traditional Indonesian ritual.

“It’s to give a nice aroma. But instead they asked me ’Why are you feeding the Satan?’” he said.

Indeed, Indonesia has not been spared as rising religious fundamentalism sweeps across Asian nations. Some local governments have begun to impose religious directives on dress codes and behaviour.

Hardliners have also labelled underground music as a form of devil worship and believe it to be haram, or forbidden in Islam, a charge metal bands have swiftly struck down.

“My voice is not used for phone porn sex so, why haram?” Asri retorted. “Metal sounds rough, but it is tolerant and celebrates diversity and creativity. It is not deviant.”

Purgatory, a Jakarta-based Muslim metal band, said it takes care not to go overboard and shove religion down people’s throats.

Band drummer Aminuddin Muqoddas, 36, said the band only encourages a clean, moral lifestyle “free of sins”. Walking the talk, the band shuns events sponsored by beer and cigarette companies.

“Allah’s laws must not be violated, like getting drunk and womanising. We don’t want to send wrong messages, so we always check our lyrics against religious scripts,” he said.

Band members perform with their faces painted like zombies, not because they want to court controversy, he said. “We are entertainers after all. Looking scary is just for fun,” Aminuddin said.

Metal musicians, however, have noted greater openness to metal culture in Islamic boarding schools and conservative provinces such as Aceh, where partial shariah law is practised.

Popular home-grown metal band Burgerkill, which has been on gigs in Europe, Asia and Australia, said it had performed to only a thousand fans in Aceh in 2012, but “multiples of thousands” last month.

“Never mind that the crowd had to be separated, girls in front and boys at the back,” guitarist Ariestanto, 40, told The Straits Times.

“We were just shocked to see so many and thought, ’Man, this is big’. It was crazy, and so cool. It’s Aceh, where the first thing you hear when you land at the airport is people reciting prayers,” he said, laughing.

He attributed the rising popularity of metal music to the Internet, where bands have begun to upload their latest songs and even professionally created music videos put on YouTube.

He might have added also the musicians’ own innovations, either through borrowing from the country’s musical past or their inventiveness.

Metal never dies

Half a dozen teenagers sit in a circle in an old library in Soreang, a town on the outskirts of Bandung, with what looked like ice-cream sticks pressed between their lips.

A series of breathing and tapping movements produce a symphony of mellow sounds and vibrations.

“And that’s how you play the karinding,” said Muchammad Dzulkarnain, 34, from metal band Karinding Attack, which revived the long-forgotten traditional Sundanese bamboo instrument in 2009. The band also uses the traditional flute and harp, as well as a newfangled contraption made of squeaky kids’ shoes stuffed in a section of bamboo. “Squeak, squeak, squeak, irritating, isn’t it? But it makes the music memorable,” he said.

“We also add a metal element using a more upbeat tempo, and our country-bumpkin karinding is cool again.”

As a “positive contribution” to the music world, the band writes books on karinding, sources local artisans to make it for sale, and even teaches students to play it, he said.

Innovation by bands like Karinding Attack helps to keep metal music fresh. A supportive community which shares knowledge and actively promotes new bands also ensures the genre’s survival.

In Bandung, officials said work is in progress to turn it into a creative city with a vibrant music scene.

“Bandung is a music warehouse. There are a lot of new creations and out-of-the-box innovations which mix old and modern music, not just metal. We plan to have a music festival,” Kenny Dewi Kaniasari, an official at the city’s culture and tourism ministry, told The Straits Times. ” We are also a melting pot of various faiths, ethnicities and cultures. We respect our differences,” she added.

The culinary event is organised under a joint initiative of the European Union Delegation, European Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Annam Fine Food and will showcase the diverse, rich and well-loved cuisine of the old continent that has been handed down over many generations and gained worldwide acclaim.

Speaking at a press conference yesterday, European Union Delegation Chargé d’AffairesMichel Goffin said this fifth European Food Festival will help to promote cultural cooperation and tourism in Vientiane and will include numerous activities, especially concerning food, with various food tents designed to match each country’s most notable characteristics.

Drinks will be on sale including European wines and beverages, and there will be fun activities for children, as well as entertainment. Visitors will have the chance to win prizes in a lucky draw, including a round trip ticket to Europe.

The European Food Festival will highlight the sheer variety of restaurants found in Vientiane, which will all be at their creative best, so as to surprise and delight visitors of all ages.

More than 25 European restaurateurs and food vendors will be joining the festivities and guests will have a chance to enjoy a journey through the amazing culinary world of Europe.

Last year, the festival featured 34 booths which attracted about 2,000 people. This year’s event will feature 46 booths, according to the organisers.

Since last year, seven more European restaurants have opened their doors, of which four will take part in this year’s food festival.

The organisers also said one of the highlights will be performances of European music by Lao and European singers.

MrGoffin said Laos is not only well known for its natural resources and tourist attractions, but also for its good quality restaurants, which are acknowledged regionally and internationally.

He said more and more Lao people are attending the European Food Festival each year, contributing to cultural and tourism cooperation in Laos.

There are currently more than 120 restaurants in Laos that are owned by European nationals, mostly in LuangPrabang, Vientiane and Champassak provinces as well as the capital. These businesses contribute considerably to the promotion of tourism in Laos, local employment, and taxes paid to the government.

Also speaking at yesterday’s press conference were the Executive Director of the European Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Laos, Ramon Bruesseler, and the Managing Director of Annam Fine Food, Benjamin Daout.

This elitism is changing however. Following a “crazy” idea, which a famous Indonesian cultural activist, Taufik Rahzen, recently managed to “sell” to the Indonesian Institute of the Arts (ISI) Art Institute of Surakarta, Central Java, as well as to the Tourism Ministry and other institutions, Western and African music are no longer the exclusive preserve of the rich, but can also be performed among and for ordinary villagers and fishermen.

When did this happen? On the occasion of a cultural “pilgrimage” organised on April 7-17 on the island of Sumbawa as a side-event to the recent Tambora Festival.

Tambora is the mountain whose 1815 eruption dwarfed the 1883 Krakatoa eruption and can only be compared to the Santorini (Cyclades islands in the Aegean Sea) eruption that destroyed the ancient Cretan civilisation.

The present government is using the 200th anniversary of this extraordinary eruption as a means to promote tourism in Sumbawa. Hence the Tambora Festival which is Taufik Rahzen’s idea of a moving festival, hence a “pilgrimage” to ensure its success.

Taufik set up the Ziarah Tambora cultural “pilgrimage” as a multi-faceted event. For its foreign participants — British, Mexican, Sri Lankan, Mozambican, American, Polish — it was a discovery of wonderful Indonesia: as they hopped from island to island in the Saleh Gulf or trekked on the slopes of Tambora, they met smiling people everywhere and nature in all its wonders and diversity.

But it was also devised as a cultural encounter. They were welcomed by villagers with songs and flowers and repaid their hosts with music from the world over.

Westerners played violin; Arone, a young Mozambican, beat African percussions with a strange, gamelan-looking wooden instrument; Leon the Mexican sung Zapotek aubades, and Bilky mesmerised all with strange Sri Lankan laments.

In the first days, there was also Mustafa “Debu” the ex-American who played, to wild applause, Muslim gambus music to Sumbawan gambus lovers.

Not to forget, among the Indonesians, the mantra-like chanting and ululations that Bambang Besur (artist) addressed to the trees and gods.

All along the atmosphere was one of equality between the participants, as well as between the artists and their Sumbawan hosts. Seen from the latter’s point of view, it was a far cry from the too often alien foreign culture they watch on TV screens or on occasional visits to beach resorts.

On the whole the experience was indeed a fascinating “pilgrimage”, a friendly discovery of cultural “otherness”, with music as its medium.

The key to the success of this pilgrimage was in the selection of its participants. There was a small core of Indonesian artists and activists.

As for the foreigners, they were picked from among the holders of Indonesian scholarships found at the ISI Art Institute in Surakarta. Most were students of Javanese gamelan (traditional ensemble music of Java) or ethnomusicology, thus already open to diversity. Yet, they all had to descend from their ivory tower, which made it an experience they will probably recall for their whole life.

Of course the Ziarah Tambora program did not aim at being entirely idealistic. It was part of an endeavor to broaden the concept of cultural tourism by opening new areas to tourism and new modes of contact between foreign visitors and Indonesians.

It is in this context that the visits to islands and Tambora plantations were organised. It also comprised on-site evaluations of complementary activities and infrastructure such as village museums, libraries, contemporary art events etc.

Finally it aimed at identifying the type of visitors best suited to this new cultural approach to tourism.

Important lessons can be drawn from the program, the principal one being that the notion of cultural tourism must be broadened: It must become participative cultural tourism. With adaptations — having cultured tourists selected and paid in one way or another- this new concept has probably a bright future ahead.

When she was one, she dressed up as Chibi Mikasa, the female soldier from manga series Attack On Titan, for the Anime Festival Asia event at Suntec Convention & Exhibition Centre.

A year later, she dressed as the revenge-seeking anti-heroine Ryuko Matoi from anime series Kill La Kill for The Cathay’s J-Obsession event. She wore a navy blue blouse and skirt, a red-and-blue bandana, and had a red streak in her hair, like the character.

She was styled by her parents – online marketer Joverst Lee and accountant Cassandra, both 23, who are avid cosplayers. They generally make their costumes themselves by modifying clothes from shops. “Cosplay is a good way for our family to spend time together,” Mr Lee says.

His wife adds: “Taking Chanel to cosplay events encourages her to be more social. It beats staying at home in front of the TV or iPad.”

Lee’s alter egos include the shy but cursed God of the Underworld Hades Aidoneus from anime series Kamigami no Asobi and the warrior Yasuo from the online game League Of Legends.

After he got married in 2010, his wife also picked up the hobby. She has dolled herself up as the goofy and energetic teenager Mako Mankanshoku from Kill La Kill, who incidentally is the best friend of Ryuko, Chanel’s character.

At Chanel’s first event when she was one, her father said she “cried and wanted to go home”.

He added: “I figured that she felt uncomfortable being around so many people. So we encouraged her to look at the pretty costumes and performances. She calmed down eventually”.

The next year, when she was dressed up as Ryuko Matoi from Kill La Kill, he went as teal-haired hacker Hoka Inumuta from the same series. He says: “This time, she had fun. She kept reaching out to touch the costumes and weapons, and smiled whenever people wanted to take photos with her.”

The couple live with their two children – they had a baby boy Jaylon last year – and Lee’s parents in a four-room HDB flat in Woodlands.

Another family which cosplays together regularly are Mr Yuen Xiang Hao, 38, his wife Rain, 35, and their daughter Xue Ling, seven.

Yuen, a physics teacher, says: “We treat it as a day out together. I like taking photos and being photographed. Rain loves meeting the other cosplayers. And for Xue Ling, it’s one long, unending adventure full of surprises.”

The family have been cosplaying together for the last three years, attending events such as The Cathay’s J-Obsession in 2014 and last year’s Comics Fiesta in Kuala Lumpur. They will also attend this year’s The Cathay’s J-Obsession.

The couple have dressed up as characters from the video game King Of Fighters: Mr Yuen as Kyo Kusanagi, a cocky high school student, and Mrs Yuen as his red-haired enemy, Iori Yagami.

Mrs Yuen, a translator in a games company, says: “Through cosplay, my daughter learns the importance of imagination.

“When she is in costume, she learns to imagine herself as someone else. And when she takes it off, I hope she learns that heroes and monsters are people, and it is our actions that ultimately define us.”

So far, Xue Ling’s characters tend to be Disney princesses such as Belle from Beauty And The Beast (1991) and Elsa from Frozen (2013). The trio have not appeared as an ensemble, but plan to do so.

Are the parents concerned about exposing their children to revealing or provocative cosplay costumes?

Mr Yuen says: “It is no different from going to the beach or walking down Orchard Road.”

Most cosplayers, he adds, are extremely considerate and those dressed as the villainous sidekick of the Joker, Harley Quinn, from the Batman comics, have taken great pains to look non-threatening and “non-insane” when speaking to his daughter. He adds: “One squatted down to talk to Xue Ling at eye level. Another put her baseball bat away. It was sweet of them.”

Lee says: “If anyone were to say that I force my daughter to cosplay, I would say that is the way I choose to raise her.

“I want her to have a happy childhood where she can dress up and imagine she can be anybody she wants. I don’t want to take away this bit of fantasy and innocence from her.”

Among the productions running between Aug 11 and Sept 17 are eight collaborations between Singaporean and international artists, in keeping with the festival theme of Potentialities and the potential inherent in the individual in today’s globalised world.

Israeli architect Ron Arad and Singapore’s Brian Gothong Tan will create a cinema-theatre hybrid at Gardens by the Bay called Tropical Traumas: A Series Of Cinematographic Choreographies, which runs from Sept 2 to 4. Arad will first create his crowd-pleasing interactive outdoor installation, 7200, previously showcased in London and Jerusalem. The cylinder, 18m in diameter, is made of 5,600 suspended silicon cords that serve as the screen for film projections. It also houses a runway across its centre.

This is the stage on which Tan will direct a 70-minute play inspired by the writings of Victorian- era explorers including Sophia Raffles. Six performers will interact with one another as well as with Tan’s multimedia creations.

Tan, 36, is no stranger to directing theatre; this is his fourth outing. But the stage in Gardens by the Bay presents challenges including competition from the nightly sound-and-light show.

Still, he says, he is excited. “Doing something for the festival, there’s no limit to the imagination.”

Festival director Ong Keng Sen says: “We are moving towards an entirely creation-driven festival. We are refusing to be a glamorous shopper going around the world shopping for productions, but instead, we’re investing in the artists and the process.”

This edition’s focus on the future follows from the 2014 theme of examining 20th-century legacies such as apartheid and last year’s theme, Post-Empires. The latter had 12 critically acclaimed homegrown productions re-examining Singapore’s history and present- day issues such as immigration and housing woes.

Ong adds: “We’ve looked at global issues in the last two festivals. In this edition, we have to bring attention to the individual who is changing the world in his context. This is very important in Singapore, which always talks about the large, engineered plan, but not the individual in this large, engineered plan.”

Other commissioned works in the $5-million festival include I Am LGB, artist Loo Zihan’s re-examination of America-born Ray Langenbach’s performance art created in Singapore in the 1990s – works which included drinking his own blood. Loo, 33, will use TheatreWorks’ space at 72-13 Mohamed Sultan Road for the four-hour performance tailored for 60 viewers at a time. He pored over a decade of footage and archival material for I Am LGB and also speaks regularly with Langenbach, now a professor at the University of Arts in Helsinki.

Loo says: “It’s probably the most ambitious work I’ve taken on. He was ahead of his time, talking about political ideology and indoctrination, and the audience was not ready for it.”

Also pushing the envelope is the festival co-produced Five Easy Pieces, directed by Switzerland’s Milo Rau. Performers are aged eight to 13, but perform for adults in a script about taboo topics such as paedophilia. Ong says he is curious how the Media Development Authority will rate this show; not all shows unveiled at the press preview yesterday have been rated.

He adds: “Will children be allowed to see it? It deals with the fact that children are harnessing power from a very young age. They know if they cry, their parents will react, for example. It’s important that we don’t shy away from that.”

Also making its Asian debut is Egyptian play The Last Supper, a comedy about a family after the Arab Spring, the wave of protests that started in Tunisia in 2010 and spread through the Arab world. Ong says that among the potentialities the festival addresses are the post 9-11 fears of terror and the Arab world.

Similarly, the pre-festival programme The O.P.E.N., from June 22 to July 9, features talks, works and performances from little-heard communities, including Newsha Tavakolian, an Iranian photojournalist, and Perhat Khaliq, a rock star from the mainly Muslim Uighur community in China.

The main season features innovations in traditional theatre. The opening act at Drama Centre Theatre is Canadian theatre-maker Robert Lepage’s Hamlet/Collage with Russia’s Theatre Of Nations. This adaptation of the Shakespeare play is a one-man show performed by Evgeny Mironov in a spinning, suspended open-sided cube.

With Shakespeare on many minds this year – the Bard’s 400th death anniversary – Ong will direct Sandaime Richard (Japanese for Richard III), a playful take on the play, from Sept 8 to 10 at Victoria Theatre. Shakespeare himself is put on trial with Singaporean Janice Koh playing his prosecutor Maachan of Venice (a play on The Merchant Of Venice) and professional Kabuki onnagata (female impersonator) Kazutaro Nakamura as Richard Sandaime. The script is from well-known playwright Hideki Noda, whose play about xenophobia, Red Demon, has been staged here at least twice, but has been trimmed and will be performed in Japanese, English as well as Bahasa Indonesia.

“It’s a lot of international work with a deep local presence,” Ong says.

Española’s animation work in the long-running Fox Broadcasting Co. TV series “The Simpsons” won for the Filipino the Emmy, the coveted recognition for excellence in the television industry.

“My interest in drawing was discovered by my teacher at San Miguel Elementary School (Lubao). Then the other teachers started making me to draw, which they used as visual aids in their classes, displaying them on their bulletin boards,” he said. “They knew I was a hungry student and drawing for them helped me to have food to eat.”

Now 56, Española said life was hard when he was growing up in the rural village of San Francisco in Lubao town, north of Manila. “I [endured] some kind of initiation in life. As a child [I] honed my skill in drawing by necessity—for food, to survive,” he said.

Though he graduated valedictorian from grade school, he did not think he could go on to high school in Lubao. So he went to Manila, staying with poor relatives in Sampaloc and Tondo districts. In the city, he washed dishes in canteens and took on odd jobs, all the while continuing to sketch.

“It was [because of my] skill in drawing [that] I was able to make it through high school and go on to college. I used it (drawing) and [attracted the attention of] people—my teachers and fellow students,” Española said.

No money for tuitionAlthough he passed the talent test at the University of the Philippines’ College of Fine Arts, he did not have money for tuition. The would-be painting major searched for his biological father and got to meet his wife, Lourdes, who worked for historian Renato Constantino.

Lourdes was very kind to Española. She contacted Constantino’s daughter, Karina David, who was then with the UP Institute of Social Work and Community Development. David lent Española the money he needed for enrollment. He repaid the loan by doing illustrations for her.

Aided by scholarships from the UP Fine Arts Alumni Foundation and the Melquiades M. Castro Foundation, the future Emmy winner graduated in 1984.

After college, Española began his career in animation in 1985 with the Makati City branch of Burbank Animation Inc. He moved to Hanna Barbera’s subsidiary Fil-Cartoons Inc. in Pasig City in 1988.

Española migrated to the United States in 1994. Based in California, he made CD-ROM educational games for 7th Level Inc. He joined Film Roman as assistant director for the television animation series “King of the Hill” in 1997.

The following year, he transferred to Rough Draft where he was involved in the making of the TV series “Futurama” for the 20th Century Fox TV network. “Futurama” won an Emmy in 2002.

Española returned to Film Roman in 2003 as assistant director for “The Simpsons.”

It was the episode “Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind,” the ninth in the series’ 19th season in late 2007, that won Española the Emmy in 2008 and made him the first Filipino animator to win the prestigious award.

“It called attention to the talents of Filipino animators,” Española said. “I think I enhanced the comedy [of the Simpsons]. I inject some jokes, take swipes at certain things. I make Matt Groening (one of the programme creators) laugh.”

He spoke recently at the First ComicCon Philippines at the Fontana Leisure Park in Clark Freeport in Pampanga, where he shared the stage with fellow Philippine-born animator Van Partible, creator of the TV animation series “Johnny Bravo.”

“I told them (local animators, cartoonists and visual artists) it was important to master the how-tos and to be basically good in drawing [manually or with the aid of the computer],” he said.

“A number of Filipinos are shadow artists,” he said, referring to “ghost illustrators” of top names in the animation and graphic novel business.

For Española, interacting with fans and creators at the ComicCon was his way of “promoting Filipino talents.”

The award-winning animator likes to laugh and share jokes, do happy animation assignments and watch 20th-century silent films of comedian Charlie Chaplin.

(Editor’s Note: We have obtained permission from Jesus “Jess” Española to use the photos that come with this story,)

With the introduction of Timbre, you can now sate both desires in one fell scoop. Opened a few months ago along the newly-minted hipster enclave, The Row (formerly known as Asian Heritage Row), Timbre is a chain of Singaporean venues with a reputation for serving up the best live music in the city state.

With their first Malaysian outpost, co-founders Edward Chia and Danny Loong are hoping to recreate the magic across the border. Interestingly, the two have actually been on the lookout for a Malaysian venue for the past 10 years and even came to check out Asian Heritage Row a decade ago.

“Back then, it wasn’t quite what we were looking for. It’s changed a lot. When the new developers took over, it became the right space,” says Chia.

Timbre has become known for its off-beat location choices, so much so that Chia said if they were to roll out a Timbre outlet in a shopping mall, people would think it very weird!

“When it came to Malaysia, we wanted something similar as well. What we like about The Row is that there is a certain modernisation to it, but also a certain preservation,” says Chia.

The two spent RM700,000 to put together the first Malaysian Timbre and it’s definitely been money well spent. The eatery is large and spacious with an equal combination of low and high tables, and interesting additions like acoustic panels to mitigate the echo effect.

If you look closely at the columns in the venue, you’ll notice they’ve been stuffed with cork wood to absorb the sound, so it doesn’t bounce around too much.

Although aesthetics are important to Chia and Loong, everything ultimately has to serve a purpose.

Like the venue’s bar tables. Unlike conventional bar tables which are often so small there’s barely enough space to lift food into your mouth without also jamming your elbow into the face of the person next to you, Timbre’s bar top tables are wide and accommodating, allowing for plenty of space to comfortably fit drinks and food.

All the tables have two built-in drawers, one that stocks cutlery and another that has an iPad with the full menu, so you can order food without the hassle of hailing a waiter.

Although Timbre advertises itself as a “live music restaurant”, you can’t help wondering if music and food can truly be successful soul mates.

How many times have you been to a bar or pub and thought the music was fab but the food was a flop or vice versa?

One always suffers at the expense of the other and few outlets are able to claim victory in both areas.

Loong agrees and says, “I know what you mean because sometimes it’s just a bar or a pub and there’s food on the side. But food is very important here.”

And you’ll find out just how important when you first glimpse the menu, which is stocked with all sorts of tapas as well as Timbre’s signature thin crust pizzas.

Some of the items on the menu, like the Chilli, Cilantro and Coconut Cream Mussels (RM23) have been specially created for the Malaysian Timbre and are not available on the Singaporean menu.

This deliciously creamy, slightly spicy mussel offering is the perfect introduction to the venue’s culinary abilities. The portion of blackshell mussels is generous and properly cooked, with spicy coconut cream soup that is rich, sumptuous and so addictive, you’ll find yourself doing an Oliver: “Please sir, can I have some more?”

While the mussels soar, the Brochette of Beef Brisket (RM30) takes a dip. The menu advertises it as a “tender” beef brisket but the brisket I get is tough-as-nails and extremely hard to chew.

Thankfully, salvation arrives in the form of the restaurant’s much-heralded thin-crust pizzas.

The Crispy Caramel Anchovies Pizza (RM30) is specially crafted for local spice aficionados and features lots of crispy sweet anchovies on a sambal base, with sautéed red onion, pineapple, melted mozzarella cheese and cucumber. Over that is drizzled aioli.

Some of the components may seem like strange bedfellows, but let me assure you that it all works beautifully, and you’ll find yourself reaching for slice after slice, calories be damned.

The Cheeseburger Pizza (RM39) is very interesting and basically features all the flavours you would typically find in a cheeseburger, except that in this case, it’s mounted atop pizza dough.

It’s a strange, revelatory experience eating this, almost like a psychological experiment where your senses are tested. It seems so wrong to eat a cheeseburger that’s really a pizza, but then you keep asking yourself – how can something so wrong taste so good?

The only downer in the pizza selection is the Roasted Duck Pizza (RM36). Apparently a best-seller in Singapore, this particular pizza hasn’t done quite as well on the home front and it’s not hard to see why.

It’s like a deconstructed Peking roast duck wrapped in thin popiah skin, and features a cast of characters that includes roasted duck breast, sautéed shiitake mushrooms with hoisin sauce topped with mozzarella cheese and crispy popiah skin.

It sounds promising on paper, but doesn’t quite work as well in reality – the duck is a tad too sweet and the crispy popiah skin curls are distracting and not that nice to eat either.

Interestingly, you are allowed to mix-and-match your favourite pizzas, which means you can order half portions of different pizzas to make up a whole.

For mains, feast on the Citrus Crusted King Salmon (RM47). Served with a beetroot puree, sautéed asparagus and lemon chive butter sauce, this is an example of a dish where everything works. The salmon is cooked and seasoned perfectly and the acidity from the citrus scattered on top offers bright bursts of flavour. Plus, that beetroot puree is really good!

The main idea at Timbre is to eat, drink and be merry. No, seriously, that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do – enjoy a good meal and listen to good live music.

According to Loong, there will even be a series of live music sessions called Malaysia Originals that basically features up-and-coming and barely established local artistes who write their own songs. This is in line with Timbre’s plan to develop support for songwriters.

Also on the live music front, expect to be in for some surprises. Because guess who performed at the Timbre launch? Dato’ Sri Idris Jala, that’s who!

And in case you’re wondering, the man can sing like a rock god and has some mad guitar skills to boot. I’ve never seen anything like it from a politician (now the coolest Malaysian politician in my books), and I doubt you have either – at least not at any other music venue in town.

While I’m not sure Idris Jala will be making regular appearances, you can rest assured other equally talented singers, bands and songwriters will (from Wednesday through Saturday).

So if you’re looking for a great place to eat, relax and unwind to good music, Timbre hits all the right notes.