MUSIC
If you're free of a Friday evening you could do worse (much worse if you're really imaginative) than to go along to one of the regular concerts of the Pusan Philharmonic Orchestra. They are in quite stellar form these days under their Texas-based conductor Sung Kwak. Their programs alternate between the standard classical repertory and less popular modern pieces; recently, Shostakovitch's rarely-heard 1st Symphony was sandwiched by performances of Beethoven's 5th and Schubert's trundling Great C Major Symphony. The orchestra is augmented by an abundant supply of talented soloists. On the same program as the Shostakovitch, for instance, Kim Hae-jong made short work of the soupy but technically demanding Rachmaninov 4th Piano Concerto, the piece that gave David Helfgott the terrors in “Shine”.
The Phil's concert master, also a gifted soloist, is Shin Sang-jun, who despite name and appearance is American. The other foreign face in the band belongs to Bulgarian French horn player Ivan Nedeltchev, who told me he turned down the post of deputy police chief of Plovdiv to come to Pusan. Bulgarian law and order's loss is clearly Pusan's gain.
Concerts start at the Cultural Centre at 7.30. Tickets are laughably cheap at 3,000-10,000.

FILM
The 4th Pusan International Film Festival has been scheduled for October 14-23, as usual taking in mid-term test week for many of the city's college students. But that's good news for some. The organizers promise about the same number of films as last year, 200, with a higher proportion, about 90, coming from Europe and the Americas. Get your tickets early.