Kangta (real name: Ahn Chil Hyun 안칠현 安七炫, October 10, 1979, Gumi, North Gyeongsang, South Korea) is well known as the lead singer of the former group H.O.T. (High-five of Teenagers). He was the boy-next-door during the H.O.T. days.
Kangta was discovered at Lotte World, a theme park, when he was only 13 years old. He then debuted as a back-up dancer together with Moon Hee Jun (another H.O.T member) for singer Yoo Young Jin. He was then 14 years old. Then he decided to become a singer, and together with the other three members Jang Woo Hyuk, Lee Jae Won and Tony Ahn, H.O.T. was formed.
He has been a great songwriter and composer, having written several songs for their album as well as for other groups and singers like NRG and Fly to the Sky. When H.O.T. was disbanded on March 2001, a legion of loyal fans were in rage. However, Kangta surprised all of them; he became the first member who debuted solo months after. He released his solo album "Polaris" and became a huge hit, it then followed with his second album "Pinetree" in 2002. On August 24-25, 2003, his first solo concert took place.
After planning for years, he worked with his celebrity best friends Lee Ji Hoon and Shin Hye Sung and formed the project group "S" which stands for "Supreme". They released their first solo project album called "Fr.In.Cl" or Friends in Classic. They won several awards since then.
Kangta & Vanness
Early 2006, Kangta collaborated with Vanness Wu, of F4, and formed Kangta & Vanness. They released their single Scandal and have been busy promoting their single all over Asia.
Drama
Kangta received several offers but he accepted a drama offer in China. In 2004, he starred in a drama called "Magic Touch of Fate魔術奇緣" together with other Chinese actors and actresses such as Ruby Lin(林心如)as Lin Xiao-Mei (林曉梅) and Alec Su(蘇有朋) as Wu Jun-An(吳俊安). KangTa(安七炫) portrayed the role of the evil magician Jin-Xiu(金修).
Soon after, he came back to Korea and released his much-awaited third album. In 2005, Kang Ta released "Persona", which included tracks that were very different from his previous two albums. Months after, he surprised his fans when he said he wanted to become an actor. A month later, he starred in a KBS drama called "Loveholic".
MPIO
During KangTa's 3rd jib Persona promotion events, he was contracted to become the spokesperson for a Korean mp3 player brand name mpio and the mp3 player model was FL350. FL350 was designed to look like and to be worn as jewelry, it has color choices of Ruby Red, Sapphire Blue and Amethyst Violet. FL350 mainly targets to the female market because of its small and jewelry figure, but in order to expand its market range to reach out to the male market, mpio invited KangTa to advertise the item while wearing it during his persona Music Video.
