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Saturday, October 4, 2008
7:42:44 AM EDT
City Opera Lays Off 11 Members of Its Staff
City Opera Lays Off 11 Members of Its Staff
By DANIEL J. WAKIN
Published: October 3, 2008
New York City Opera has laid off 11 members of its administrative staff because of financial pressures and a lack of work caused by the cancellation of most of its season, a spokesman said on Friday.
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Related
Music: At City Opera, Concern Over a Visionary Whose Eye Seems to Wander (October 4, 2008)
Times Topics: New York City Opera
The employees, mostly in junior positions, were dismissed on Wednesday and given severance packages, said the spokesman, Pascal Nadon. “There is no plan for them to be rehired,” he said in a telephone interview.
The opera is offering limited programming while its Lincoln Center home, the New York State Theater, is renovated. “Fewer staff members are needed to implement the coming season,” Mr. Nadon wrote in an e-mail message. The company “believes that this reorganization will position the opera to deal with current economic conditions.”
The laid-off employees come from a “variety of departments,” Mr. Nadon said, including marketing, development, finance, artistic and production. The entire administrative staff numbers 82.
The layoffs weren’t announced but were confirmed after a reporter’s inquiry and come just before Saturday’s season opener, a concert on Staten Island by City Opera Orchestra and Chorus. The layoffs follow other turbulence, including a quixotic bid by the general manager-designate, Gerard Mortier, to take over the Bayreuth Festival in Germany, which surprised board members.
City Opera faces a deficit of up to $15 million, made up of previous shortfalls and an expected gap this season. Fund-raising had also fallen, as some board members were not convinced by Mr. Mortier’s plans to shake up the company, Mr. Mortier has said. But company officials say the board is now behind him.
In what Mr. Nadon called an unrelated development, the opera’s executive director, Jane M. Gullong, will leave the company, as Mr. Mortier has effectively eliminated her job. “The way Gerard Mortier works is, he never had an executive director in previous functions,” Mr. Nadon said. “It was clear that Gerard would not need an executive director.”
Ms. Gullong, who Mr. Nadon said was leaving on good terms, will depart at the end of the year. She was named executive director in late 2004 and was the chief fundraiser for a decade before that. She did not return a voice mail message left on Friday.
Mr. Mortier is in his last year as director of the Paris National Opera and will take over at City Opera next season. He was in Paris on Friday, and there was no answer at his office.
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Friday, October 3, 2008
8:06:21 AM EDT
Uganda: Court Orders African Children's Choir to Account for U.S. Funds
Uganda: Court Orders African Children's Choir to Account for U.S. Funds
New Vision (Kampala)
1 October 2008
Posted to the web 2 October 2008
Dismus Buregyeya
Kampala
MASAKA chief magistrate David Batema has ordered the Glory Ministry International to account for earnings from music shows its children's choir earned in a tour of the US recently.
A group of 20 children, under the Kampala-based African Children Choir, who went on a five-month trip to the US, were presented before the court in Masaka on September 26.
Batema said the Government directed the children to report to court after their return to ensure their safety. "We are experiencing child-trafficking problems.
"The government is interested in ensuring that all the children who went to the US for the trip returned safely. The other concern is the accountability of the funds raised during their concerts," he said.
Speaking about their experience on the trip, the group leader, Betty Kisakye, said: "We talked much about the beauty of our country. We generally had a nice time apart from the strange diet."
The children visited 25 states in the US. However, the group's financial leader, Kerry Harles, told court that thugs broke into their vehicle in Chicago and stole their property, including a laptop computer, which contained information about the trip.
Harles was responding to the demands to account for the money raised from the shows. She said data about collections and expenditures was on the laptop that was stolen.
"I cannot give court the financial report now, but when I return to the US on Tuesday, I will bring the report," she said.
She said the US police were still investigating the theft, adding that she would get the information from the churches where the children held the shows.
"The money is safe because the churches used to collect it on our behalf," she said.
Harles said part of the money would be used to pay the children's third term school fees.
The Chief Magistrate warned the organisation that if they failed to provide the accountability before January next year, the group's activities would be suspended, adding that Harles would also be barred from coming to Uganda.
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8:04:20 AM EDT
Angola: Musicians Plead for More Aid to Record CDs
Angola: Musicians Plead for More Aid to Record CDs
Angola Press Agency (Luanda)
2 October 2008
Posted to the web 2 October 2008
Huambo
Musicians in the central Huambo Province are appealing for more support from local businesspeople and other entities, for them to record albums.
ANGOP learnt this after interviewing recently several local musicians, who were unanimous in recognising that due to the development that music in this province has achieved, it would be a great incentive if every year two Cds by Huambo Province singers were released.
"Music in Huambo Province is on the right path. Both the veteran musicians and the artists of the new generation have been engaged in doing their best, but incentives are missing for musicians to be able to release CDs to be listened to throughout the country ", the musician and songwriter João Baptista Joly said.
To the artist Valter Tchaly, the lack of Cds by Huambo musicians contradicts the current state of development that the local music has achieved.
"Whenever a local singer releases an album, they are always praised by musicians from other provinces, therefore I assume that with more support local musicians might be references for the country. ", he underlined.
On her turn, the singer Lily de Vasconcelos, who also shares the same opinion of the other musicians, said that the local entrepreneurs and government should invest in the creation of musicians training centres, in order to upgrade their melody making performances.
"There is quality, but it is not enough. A lot of musicians, though they have shown a lot of abnegation and dedication, do not have any musical training", she regretted.
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8:02:17 AM EDT
South Africa: Alexandra Remains Spiritual Home to Country's Leaders
South Africa: Alexandra Remains Spiritual Home to Country's Leaders
Business Day (Johannesburg)
2 October 2008
Posted to the web 2 October 2008
Johannesburg
AN ALEXANDRA-raised hip-hop artist once described the township as "the township of townships", where you owe your survival to your ancestors.
Flabba, a member of hip-hop group Skwatta Kamp, was right. This year, newspapers reported that he was chased by a young armed man after a game of dice. Apparently, Flabba's crime was attempting to take his winnings home. Fortunately he survived as his brother came to his rescue. Others do not.
That is what the township is notorious for these days. However, back in the struggle days the township was a political training ground that produced a long list of militant leaders. The list includes the late Alfred Nzo, Joe Modise, Moses Kotane, Thomas Nkobi, Florence Mophosho, Joe Nhlanhla, Thoko Mngoma, former first lady Zanele Mbeki and SA's new president Kgalema Motlanthe.
Even the young Nelson Mandela moved to Alexandra on his arrival in Johannesburg from Eastern Cape in the 1940s.
The land on which Alexandra grew was a portion of a farm owned by a man known as Mr Papenfus. The township was formed in 1912, when black migrants bought stands from the farmer, and later more miners moved on to the land.
The township was where many boycott campaigns to resist apartheid government policies were first discussed and spread like wildfire through the township and the country.
Obed Bapela, an African National Congress (ANC) MP, says the political influence in Alex came with black migrants and political activists who had been moved from Sophiatown and George Goch, and also that the township was formed in the same year as the ANC.
"During that period the country was reshaping itself ... the place becamea magnet for political activists."
Bapela says the late Moses Kotane, who lived in the township, was a very influential member of the ANC during Chief Albert Luthuli's time. Bapela says Luthuli held Kotane's views in high regard .
"If the leadership had not received Kotane's opinion they would have to go back to him before Luthuli agreed on any matter. "
He says Kotane went on to mentor Mandela, who lived next to an Anglican church where his uncle was a priest.
Bapela says from 1959 the apartheid government noticed that the township was breeding militant leaders, and they started to forcefully move residents to Soweto and Tembisa.
Motlanthe's family and Mandela were among those moved to Soweto. Another ANC MP, Isaac Mogase, and late intelligence minister Joe Nhlanhla were also moved to Diepkloof in Soweto.
"Alexandra was able to produce leaders generation after generation because of the influx of migrants who were unionised, and there was a strong presence of political organisations," Bapela says.
He says more young leaders emerged through the years as they followed in the footsteps of their forefathers.
Mogase still remembers the boycott campaigns of the 1950s, such as the 1957 bus boycott and the potato boycott of 1959 .
He says during those days the ANC was not banned and people were allowed to hold gatherings.
"Because Alex was a very small area, it was easy to mobilise people. One was able to run around the township distributing pamphlets."
He says all ANC leaders at the time had been to Alexandra to address the people.
Today products of Alexandra occupy influential positions in South African politics. Motlanthe was recently elected president , and Gauteng ANC chairman Paul Mashatile could be announced as premier of the country's economic hub tomorrow.
Although Mashatile is facing competition from his deputy, Nomvula Mokonyane and ANC Women's League president Angie Motsheka, the Alexandra politician is widely tipped to replace Mbhazima Shilowa.
The township of townships seems set to continue being the incubator of SA's top political leaders.
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8:00:22 AM EDT
Angola: Sabino Henda Considers 'Magnificent' Evolution of Angolan Music
Angola: Sabino Henda Considers 'Magnificent' Evolution of Angolan Music
Angola Press Agency (Luanda)
1 October 2008
Posted to the web 1 October 2008
Luanda
Angolan music had a "magnificent" evolution in production, promotion and album editing from 1980 to 2008, but there is still need for higher investment in research and training.
This was said Tuesday in Luanda by the renowned Angolan singer Sabino Henda, who emphasised that it is urgent musical training opportunities for singers, promoters and editors.
He also said that there should be more research on the country's typical rhythms.
"We should all go to school and retrieve our roots and value them (...), so we can better fit in globalisation. But for such we also need incentives" stressed the singer, in an interview that comes in the ambit of the International Music Day, marked on October 01.
Sabino Henda, who was one of the most applauded acts in the International Music Festival of Sumbe (Festisumbe 2008), held last weekend, praised the support the state has been giving to artists, but he added that producers and editors were in need of more investment and institutional aid.
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7:57:31 AM EDT
Eddie Adcock - The Bionic Banjo Player
Eddie Adcock - The Bionic Banjo Player
 For a musician, there aren’t many things more fearsome than developing a tremor in your picking hand. Eddie Adcock decided not to sit idly by and live with a diminished skill level due to such a complication. During the month of August, he underwent a three stage surgical procedure at Nashville’s Vanderbilt Medical Center, intended to reverse the problem with his right hand.
Adcock celebrated his 70th birthday in June of this year. After years of playing in smoke filled venues, he suffers from emphysema and doctors say it’s possible that the medications he has taken for that have been a contributing factor in the development of his right hand tremor. After trying, unsuccessfully, to control the shaking via a dozen different medications over a period of several years, Adcock has now become the first non-Parkinsons musician to undergo the three stage procedure known as Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) at Vanderbilt Medical Center.
The procedure is so new that the Neurosurgery department at Vanderbilt videotaped the surgeries for their own instructional use, and possible PBS broadcast at some point in the future.
The three surgeries include the implantation of a pulse generator (IPG) inside the chest wall, an extension wire from the IPG to the head, and an electrical lead placed in the brain to stimulate brain activity with the electrical pulses.
During the brain implantation surgery, the patient is kept conscious so they may assist the doctors in properly placing the leads. They do this by experiencing its immediate effects on their fine motor skills. In Eddie’s case, this would be his right hand picking the banjo. Eddie took a Deering GoodTime banjo into surgery with him (see the picture at top). I’m sure that was first!
Eddie has related that this was not an easy process to experience.
I came up in music the hard way and learned to be a trouper fast. Some of those early days were pretty rough, and I’ve been stomped, cut and kicked; but I never went through hell like this — it was the most painful thing I’ve ever endured. And it was risky. But I did it for a reason: I’m looking forward to being able to play music the way I did years ago prior to getting this tremor. It means that much to me. I’m far from being done!
He has also expressed appreciation to his neurologists and neurosurgeons, along with all the staff at Vanderbilt. He also sends his thanks to those who sent cards and good wishs, and kept him in their prayers during the month of August. He’s in good spirits now as he recovers from not only the surgery, but also the pre-op hair cut he received.
I’m beginning to get used to wearing a do-rag, though. The girls seem to like it.
The Bionic Banjo Player does ask for your continued prayer support as he is scheduled for a post-op checkup late this month, and then in early October the IPG will be turned on and the device will be programmed for strength and intensity of signal.
By Travis Tackett Filed under: Bluegrass News Tagged with: Eddie Adcock • Martha Adcock • The Adcocks
We spoke with Eddie and Martha Adcock back in June during Bean Blossom and Martha had let us know that Eddie was scheduled to go in for Brain Surgery in the near future to control a right hand tremor that was impairing his ability to play banjo and guitar. Eddie is doing well and still has some post-op appointments coming up to ensure all is ok. We wish him a speedy recovery and can’t wait to hear Eddie & Martha back in action.
Martha sent us this update on Eddie’s surgery and what work the doctor’s still have to do.
Now you can truly call Eddie Adcock the Bionic Banjo Player –and don’t forget Gearhead Guitarist– as he recovers from some remarkable brain surgeries to control a right-hand tremor.
 Eddie Adcock entertains the doctors with his Deering Good Time banjo during Pre-Op. The three-part surgery, termed Deep Brain Stimulation, involved implantation of electrodes into the brain as well as insertion of a palm-sized battery-powered generator within the chest wall, plus lead wires to connect the two. The technologically-advanced procedure was performed in multiple stages over the month of August in Nashville, Tennessee, at Vanderbilt Medical Center, a teaching and research hospital which is a world leader in neurological studies and surgeries.
Those neurosurgeons were eager to operate on Eddie, with his life-long high level of musical accomplishment and the unique requirements related to his fine motor skills. During the brain-implantation stage of the surgery, he was kept conscious in order to be able to play his Deering GoodTime banjo and assist the team of surgeons in directing the fine-tuning of their placement of electrodes in the brain — an operating-room ‘first’.
According to Eddie, “I came up in music the hard way and learned to be a trouper fast. Some of those early days were pretty rough, and I’ve been stomped, cut and kicked; but I never went through hell like this — it was the most painful thing I’ve ever endured. And it was risky. But I did it for a reason: I’m looking forward to being able to play music the way I did years ago prior to getting this tremor. It means that much to me. I’m far from being done!”
Iconic bluegrass/newgrass picker Eddie Adcock, who turned seventy years old in June, began his career as a youngster touring his native central Virginia, then migrating to the Washington DC area, and from there jumping off onto the national and international stage. He’s now an inductee into numerous Halls of Fame.
Eddie adds, “All those smoky places I used to play earned me the emphysema I’ve got now too.” His breathing medications may possibly have been a factor in the development of his hand’s tendency to shake; but as Eddie points out, “I’ve gotta breathe!”
For the past several years, his primary neurologist had prescribed around a dozen different medications in hopes of quelling the tremor affecting Eddie’s playing and writing. However, none worked, and some had unfortunate side effects. Eddie then underwent a number of evaluations which determined him to be a good likely candidate for Deep Brain Stimulation surgery. Eddie is now the first non-Parkinsons musician to have undergone the DBS procedure at Vanderbilt Medical Center. He has benefitted from the numerous innovative techniques and apparatuses developed by Vanderbilt Neurosciences, and his surgeries were videotaped for Vanderbilt Neurosurgery’s use….and you may eventually see him on PBS!
Eddie’s currently sporting a new haircut, an original design consisting of shaved spots as well as #1-clipper-setting-length fuzz, all showcasing several serious-looking suture areas. “I’m beginning to get used to wearing a do-rag, though. The girls seem to like it.”
Eddie wishes to thank his team of neurologists and neurosurgeons, especially Dr. Joseph Neimat and Dr. Craig Woodard, for their enthusiasm and great attitude as well as their amazing talents; and he thanks Vanderbilt Medical Center’s wonderful staff for their care. And Eddie and I both thank all our friends and family and fans –and the total strangers– who have sent their good wishes and kindly kept us in their prayers. That has been the best medicine of all!
It’s not over yet, though: a post-op checkup is slated for late September, and in early October the docs will finally turn the generator on and begin programming the device’s strength and intensity. So please keep sending good thoughts Eddie’s way!
We both hope you will understand that it’s been impossible to keep up with email or to do much personal communicating at all, as we’ve been concentrating on getting Eddie through this ordeal….and out the other side better than ever!
All the best,
Martha (& Eddie) Adcock
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7:45:58 AM EDT
Angola: Singer Calls for More Acoustic Music in Shows
Angola: Singer Calls for More Acoustic Music in Shows
Angola Press Agency (Luanda)
2 October 2008
Posted to the web 3 October 2008
Luanda
Angolan musician and composer Kizua Gourgel called for the need to make people become familiar to shows based on acoustic instruments.
After his show entitled "Kizua Gourgel Acústico", performed last Sunday at Luanda's "Espaço Bahia", which gathered around 300 people, the singer referred that the show served to promote and give value to the Angolan culture, through this rhythmic way.
His show of two and half hours show was marked by the tracks "Caminhos Cruzados", "Cacimbo", "Canção de Amor" and "Talvez um dia", among others.
The "Kizua Gourgel Acústico" project comprises two shows performed on September 27 and 28, and counted on the participation of the "Apocalipse" band of coastal Kwanza Sul province.
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Tuesday, September 30, 2008
11:00:45 AM EDT
Good 5769 I Prayed for you at 5:00am prayer today
To the men I say:
L'shanah tovah tikatev v'taihatem
To the ladies I say:
L'shanah tovah tikatevi v'taihatemi"
May you be inscribed and sealed for a good year
Good 5769
Phil
Hakkadosh,barukh hu
Hakkadosh,barukh hu
5:00am Prayer Today
I Prayed for you at 5:00am prayer today
A "Deafening" travail was energized and electrified in the presence of the Lord today. The prayers of intercession were forceful, unified, persistent and supplicant. Oh My!
In the opulence of His presence I remembered your name.....
In His presence I saw the louver doors begin to open as the dawn of Gods presence burst through the louver doors (08/08/08 Click here: 080808 and Head of the Year 5769)). Then your light shall break forth like the morning, Your healing shall spring forth speedily, And your righteousness shall go before you; The glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard
And an acceptable day to the LORD?
6 “ Is this not the fast that I have chosen:
To loose the bonds of wickedness,
To undo the heavy burdens,
To let the oppressed go free,
And that you break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
And that you bring to your house the poor who are cast out;
When you see the naked, that you cover him,
And not hide yourself from your own flesh?
8 Then your light shall break forth like the morning,
Your healing shall spring forth speedily,
And your righteousness shall go before you;
The glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.
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Sunday, September 28, 2008
7:38:05 AM EDT
And She Is Telling You She Is Just Getting Started
And She Is Telling You She Is Just Getting Started
By BEN SISARIO
Published: September 26, 2008
WHEN Jennifer Hudson began working on the film “Dreamgirls” in late 2005, she pulled aside Henry Krieger, who wrote the music, and asked for his patience.
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Tom Ackerman for The New York Times
Jennifer Hudson on her debut album: “No one has waited longer than me.”
Enlarge This Image 
David James/DreamWorks Pictures and Paramount Pictures
Jennifer Hudson, right in “Dreamgirls”.
“She said, ‘Henry, I want to tell you I’m a slow learner, but I will get it,’ ” Mr. Krieger recalled. “I saw the look in her eye, and I believed her. And she did come through, exactly in her way — slowly.”
It’s been nearly five years since Ms. Hudson, 27, emerged as a sweet-natured, big-belting “American Idol” contestant from Chicago. She made it to seventh place, and when she won an Academy Award last year as best supporting actress in “Dreamgirls,” she became a symbol of second chances. On Tuesday she gets a chance at yet another kind of fame with her debut album, “Jennifer Hudson” (Arista), something she and her fans have had to be especially patient about.
“Everybody’s like, ‘Oh, we’ve been waiting for this album forever,’ ” Ms. Hudson said in a Manhattan recording studio in July, where she was doing a photo shoot. “But no one has waited longer than me. I’ve been waiting since I was 7 years old.”
Despite her familiarity from the movies, television and prominent gigs like singing the national anthem last month at the Democratic National Convention in Denver (at the request of Senator Barack Obama) Ms. Hudson is still a risky proposition in the music industry. She’s on the brink of household-name status yet hasn’t scored a hit song of her own. She has a bold, powerful voice but not the centerfold physique of most of the women who top the pop charts. And that Oscar has created expectations difficult for any first-timer to meet.
Many in the industry, including even her admirers, wonder if she can pull it off.
“You can put all types of material in front of her and she’ll knock it out of the park,” said Stephen Hill, the interim president of BET. “But will all types of material sell? Matching her with material she could do well probably wasn’t the problem. Whittling it down to how we can categorize it is a problem in more than one way.”
To introduce her, Ms. Hudson’s record label has had to strike a balance between establishing a clearly identifiable, saleable persona and allowing her versatility to bloom. Overseen by the longtime record executive Clive Davis, “Jennifer Hudson” casts her as a queen of contemporary, pop-leaning R&B, with a bit of the hip-hop sass of Alicia Keys. Some of the top producers and songwriters in pop music contributed, including Timbaland, Stargate, Diane Warren and Missy Elliott. But the album didn’t come quickly, or easily.
Over 18 months of sessions, which had to fit around Ms. Hudson’s crowded filmmaking schedule — besides “Dreamgirls,” she appeared in “Sex and the City” and has two more films in the can, including “The Secret Life of Bees,” set for a Oct. 17 release — dozens of songs were recorded and rejected in search of the right material. While not unheard of for a major pop album, that delay is an eternity by the make-the-record-while-the-iron-is-hot standards of “American Idol.”
Just as important as her material, of course, is Ms. Hudson’s public image as a singer; in the video for “Spotlight,” the first single, she comes across as both a diva and a relatable gal next door. In it she acts out a fantasy of escaping a jealous lover’s scrutiny by slipping on her heels and heading to a club where the Campari flows freely. It’s a standard R&B and hip-hop scene with ecstatic dancers and lots of bling, and Ms. Hudson’s vocal flights and hands-on-hips attitude invite comparisons to Mariah Carey, Christina Aguilera and Ms. Keys — women who match a strong voice to an even stronger personality.
But Ms. Hudson seems less herself strutting in her tightly squeezed top and leather jacket than in the video’s bookend scenes at home, chatting on the phone with a girlfriend. Like Effie White, her character from “Dreamgirls,” or Louise, her role as the personal assistant to Sarah Jessica Parker in “Sex and the City,” she is less the glamorous princess than the everyday woman, the underdog, the striver.
Plenty of actresses have made albums before, but Ms. Hudson is different. In an era of wispy, media-trained celebutantes she has an easy populist appeal, like the quiet girl in high school who suddenly comes alive in the school play, making everybody proud. And her early education in the music of pop queendom seems less a step in world domination than a simple girlish enjoyment. Besides performing in a church choir she learned the ropes singing along to Whitney Houston songs. “She would sing on the record,” Ms. Hudson said, “and I would throw another note on it and it sounded like a Whitney Houston-Jennifer Hudson duet.”
Even with an Academy Award under her belt Ms. Hudson has not given up her childhood dream of making it as a singer, which in her pre-“Idol” days motivated her through dues-paying jobs like performing on a Disney cruise ship.
And hallelujah, can she sing. However unusual her path to stardom Ms. Hudson is a bona fide vocal athlete, proving herself in “Dreamgirls” with one of the all-time great diva workouts, “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going,” which Jennifer Holliday had melismatized into Broadway history in 1981, the year Ms. Hudson was born.
“It’s like I came in through the back door,” said Ms. Hudson at the recording studio, dressed in a plain purple shirt, black skirt and black leggings — the same comfort clothes she had worn when arriving at ABC’s “Good Morning America” the previous day. “Even I don’t understand it. I have to laugh at myself, like, I won an Academy Award? I’m an actress, almost before being a singer, when that’s almost all I’ve ever known?”
And She Is Telling You She Is Just Getting Started
Published: September 26, 2008
(Page 2 of 2)
In conversation too Ms. Hudson is decidedly nonsuperstar. She fidgets when she talks, idly lining up the computer and mouse of a studio console, confessing her love of gadgets and loathing of heels. “I’m just this normal person,” she said. “I don’t like wearing a lot of makeup or being overdressed all the time. I want to be comfortable, wear no makeup, have my hair all over my head.”
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Doug Pensinger/Getty Images
Singing the national anthem at the Democratic National Convention last month.
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Ray Mickshaw/Fox
Competing in “American Idol” in 2004.
Her exposure has created a large but heterogeneous potential audience: imagine the range of radio stations listened to by everyone who liked “Dreamgirls” or “Sex and the City.” Mr. Davis, chief creative officer for Sony BMG Worldwide, who signed Ms. Hudson to the company’s Arista label after she had been cast in “Dreamgirls,” said that part of the long process of making the album involved choosing a sound and a style that would establish a distinct persona for her as a recording artist.
“This is not a movie star making a record album,” he said. “The approach here is that this is an artist with an incredible natural voice, that brings the house down in every performance that she gives. The real challenge is to come up with material thatis radio-friendly, so that she can have a recording career, as compared to just doing songs that showcase her voice.”
To hear Ms. Hudson tell it, it goes beyond the material selected: she comes with all kinds of demographic baggage.
“I can’t just put out an R&B song and expect that to go over for everyone,” she said. “I can’t do that with a pop song either. On the album there’s a hip-hop song, a gospel-inspirational song for my church base, and then we have to have the big ballads for fans through ‘Dreamgirls’ or ‘Idol.’ And of course I’m black, so we have to have music for African-American people, which is more on the R&B end. It’s a huge fan base, and that was the scariest part, which is where the pressure came in.”
Perhaps as a result of this awareness, “Jennifer Hudson” covers a number of stylistic bases. The team of Stargate and Ne-Yo, who have worked with Beyoncé and Rihanna, wrote and produced two tracks in their signature rhythmic yet candied style, “Spotlight” and “Can’t Stop the Rain” (the latter written just days before Ms. Hudson won her Oscar). Timbaland’s “Pocketbook” has a beat-box rhythm and a guest rap by Ludacris. “You Pulled Me Through,” “Giving Myself” and “Invisible” are the kind of slow-burn torch songs that Ms. Hudson calls “power ballads” and claims as her specialty.
Add to those songs “And I Am Telling You” and “Jesus Promised Me a Home” and you have an album that can be marketed to hip-hop-loving teenagers, fans of Ms. Houston or Ms. Carey, adult contemporary radio and even Broadway and gospel listeners. That’s a broad range, but what makes her most appealing to fans may have nothing to do with radio format or marketing genre.
“Her core audience is going to be people who love big, emotive voices,” said Mr. Hill of BET, “but that’s not a category you’re going to find in a record shop.”
Whether cooing her way through the midtempo “Spotlight,” or singing a self-esteem anthem like “Invisible” (“No more standing in the back of the line/’Cause I’m invisible for the last time”), she always builds to a wailing climax — the moment when she ceases being merely a skilled vocalist and becomes Jennifer Hudson, star.
That transformation was apparent at the “Good Morning America” studio in Times Square on a hot Monday in July, when she ran through a rehearsal of “Spotlight” at about 6:20 a.m. She began with her arms somewhat awkwardly at her side, as members ofthe show’s crew checked clipboards, studied monitors and unfurled cables. By the second chorus she was exploding her part loudly and playfully, leaving her band to follow their script as she extemporized a torrent of loose, emphatic syllables scattered across the scale. Every face in the room was turned to her, and once she finished the room erupted into applause.
But can Ms. Hudson muster that magnetism in situations other than a song’s climax?
Tor Erik Hermansen of Stargate said that early this year he and his producing partner, Mikkel S. Eriksen, had been summoned by Mr. Davis to make a “copyright” — his shorthand for a timeless pop classic. In a marathon session with Ne-Yo they wrote “Spotlight” for Ms. Hudson, Rihanna’s summer hit “Take a Bow” and Ne-Yo’s “Closer.” When they recorded with Ms. Hudson, they had expected a strong personality on the order of Effie White.
“She is such a good singer, but at the same time she’s humble to the point that you sometimes think she is insecure,” Mr. Hermansen said. “Then she goes to the mic and she just blows you away. The swagger that she has onscreen and on the mic didn’t come across till she started to sing.”
In “Dreamgirls” she played the squelched talent of a Supremes-like girl group, whose career was deflected in favor of her inferior but more beautiful backup singer, played by Beyoncé. The film’s view of a sexist, unfair business, Ms. Hudson said, rang true for her. “That’s how the music industry is structured,” she said. “It’s 90 percent image, 10 percent talent.”
After performing on “Good Morning America” Ms. Hudson expressed some frustration that wherever she goes, fans rush her and call her Effie. “No one knows me,” she said. “They know Effie. They know Louise. But you never really get to know, O.K., who is Jennifer Hudson. This album and the music side help introduce Jennifer Hudson.”
So what do you want this album to tell people about Jennifer Hudson?
“Nothing in particular,” she answered sweetly, then quickly added, “I just want them to at least have a sense of what I’m like, who I am, where I come from, what I do, where I’ve been.” Written by kingbing1
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Friday, September 26, 2008
8:07:34 AM EDT
Angola: National Music School Organises Show and Lectures
Angola: National Music School Organises Show and Lectures
Angola Press Agency (Luanda)
22 September 2008
Posted to the web 22 September 2008
Luanda
The Angolan National Music School will organises on 1 to 4 October a music-didactic show and lectures to mark the World Music Day, to be celebrated on October 1, ANGOP has learnt.
In an interview to ANGOP, the institution's director Gaspar Neto informed that the activities aim at showing what the students have been learning in terms of composition, music creation and production.
Gaspar Neto added that they intend to present, especially in terms of instrument songs, music that few people play and is less known in the country.
The event will include participation of some names from the national music scene.
According to the director, the lectures aim at giving to the public discussions about the importance of musical instruments.
With 50 students, the National Music School currently teaches piano, guitar and singing.
Written by kingbing1
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