The Sharp Corp. robot vacuum cleaner on display at the ongoing CEATEC trade show is no mere machine. Dubbed Cocorobo, it collaborates with a singing voice synthesizer software called Vocaloid and can hold simple conversations and even sing to people. The Osaka-based firm has been gearing ...
My 2015 kicked off with a January concert by Hatsune Miku, Japan's digital pop star, in Las Vegas. It is winding down with a visit to Miku's creator, Hiroyuki Itoh, at his company's head office in Sapporo, Hokkaido. I've long learned to temper my skepticism ...
Japanese virtual pop sensation Hatsune Miku has toured the world, performing "live" on stages from Singapore to Los Angeles and even opening for Lady Gaga. But despite legions of adoring fans and worldwide recognition, the computer-generated star, who made her first concert appearance overseas in ...
Tokyo-based electronic musician mus.hiba has worked with a handful of vocalists during his short stint as a producer. However, many of them haven't been human. His go-to voice belongs to Sekka Yufu, who boasts a light delivery that fits with mus.hiba's slowly unwinding swirl of ...
One November evening in Paris, Theatre du Chatelet was packed with people who came to see the French premiere of a new opera by a Japanese composer. But it was nothing like opera as we know it. Instead of an orchestra and singers performing the familiar ...
Roppongi Hills was unlike anything Tokyo had ever seen before. Until it opened 10 years ago, Roppongi was more often seen as a "High Touch Town," where businessmen partied with foreign hostesses and off-duty soldiers packed the nightclubs.
On her own, Japanese pop superstar Hatsune Miku can't sing. Nor can she rap, dance or DJ. She is drug- and alcohol-free because she can't indulge in either, and she can't have affairs or engage in offstage shenanigans fit for YouTube scandals or tabloid ...
