Singer Lee Hyori performs at Hyundai Card's Da Vinci Motel event held at Hyundai Card Zone's Understage building in Yongsan-gu, Seoul, Sunday. (Lee Hyori's Instagram)
Hyundai Card's Da Vinci Motel culture fest on Sunday kicked into high gear with pop diva Lee Hyori gracing the stage.
Lee was the final performer of the three-day music and culture event hosted by Korea's No. 1 card company at its cultural complex located in Itaewon of Yongsan-gu, Seoul.
Celebrating the singer's long-awaited return to the stage, hundreds of fans gathered to Hyundai Card's Understage building, the part of the multipurpose culture spaces where music gigs took place over the past three days. Other performances and talk shows took place in different parts of the venue, including Storage and Music Library.
Around a dozen songs spanning her 25-year music career were performed that night.
Blasting out into the night were her iconic dance hits, such as "10 Minutes," "U-Go-Girl," "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" and "Mr. Big." Her longtime fans were given a treat with some unexpected numbers from her early days, with the likes of "Blue Rain," her Fin.K.L group debut single, and "One Two Three N'Four" from her first solo LP.
Lee performed her 2008 song "Barbershop's Daughter" for the first time onstage that night. Having penned the lyrics herself based on her own story, the singer said Sunday the song "rings the deepest in my heart even until now."
The veteran singer also turned the stage into a forum to mingle with and introduce young and talented musicians -- female rappers Goeunisback and KittiB and singer-producer Babylon. Babylon, whom Lee endorsed as one of her closest musician friends that night, also took the stage alone with "Call Me Anytime," a song that Lee produced.
Lee's 1 1/2-hour show marked a splendid finale to this year's Da Vinci Motel event that ran from Friday to Sunday. According to Hyundai Card, around 3,000 tickets were sold in total.
Da Vinci Motel kicked off in 2019 with the aim to offer a site for entertainment and inspiration for the public. The name comes from a motor hotel in 1960s California where travelers rested amid long drives.
This year saw some 40 high-profile headline speakers from various fields, ranging from art and academia to business, technology and science. Hyundai Card's Vice President Chung Tae-young, Woowa Brothers' founder and Chairman Kim Bong-jin, contemporary artist Tom Sachs and professional golfer Annika Sorenstam were among them.
Alongside Lee Hyori, a celebrated lineup comprising Dynamic Duo, MeloMance, Lee Juck, Jannabi and more took the stage, while musicians from more niche genres such as producer 250 and dance crew Prowdmon introduced new sounds.
This year's event was held in collaboration with US tech giant Meta and featured state-of-the-art mixed reality and augmented reality experiences and exhibitions.
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