Jazz News

Microsoft Releases Windows 7 Beta as a Free Download

Source: All About Jazz
January 8, 2009

Microsoft's excitable CEO Steve Ballmer showed off Windows 7 -- the slick, fast, user-friendly successor to the much-maligned Windows Vista -- and said it will be available as a public beta on Friday.

Unveiled by an intense Ballmer during his keynote address on the eve of CES 2009, Windows 7 will offer better performance on underpowered machines such as netbooks, support for multitouch interfaces, and simplified home networking. Ballmer said that this would be the “best version of Windows ever" ...

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Cellphone Bills That Truly Roam/ Understanding the Fine Print

Source: Michael Ricci
January 8, 2009

The Roaming Orgy: iPhone, data and the telecoms

Using a data-enabled cellphone in a foreign land has become a little like falling asleep on a train in Naples if youre not careful, you could end up with empty pockets. You know the feeling.

Shock, fear, panic, said Mike Cottmeyer, a software consultant in Suwanee, Ga., referring to an $800 iPhone data bill hed been hit with after visiting Toronto for a few days last year. It kind of makes you ...

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Live Nation Ticketing is Live

Source: All About Jazz
January 8, 2009

Live Nation Launches Ticketing Company. The bulk of the world's largest promoter's 10-year contract with Ticketmaster has expired and the company has now launched its in-house ticketing company.

“Anytime you have a major rollout, you hold your breath and hope there are no major glitches," Live Nation CEO of global music Jason Garner tells Billboard. “We went live over the [holiday] break and I didn't hear one complaint from anybody about the system." Garner admits the rollout was “pretty complex, ...

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Mike Watt Riffs on Ron Asheton and the Stooges

Source: Michael Ricci
January 8, 2009

Mike Watt, bassist for punk groups the Minutemen and Firehose, was invited in 2003 by Iggy Pop to join the Stooges when the seminal Michigan band reunited for its first performance in nearly 30 years at the Coachella Valley Arts & Music Festival.

He continued to perform and record as a Stooge for the next 5 1/2 years alongside founding members Ron Asheton, the guitarist who was found dead this week at age 60; his brother, drummer Scott Asheton; and ...

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Gene Parrish Longtime Classical Music Radio Host Dies

Source: Michael Ricci
January 8, 2009

Gene Parrish, a longtime host of classical music programs on KUSC-FM (91.5) who also wrote and produced syndicated programs on worldwide jazz and American choral music, has died. He was 82. Parrish, of Hermosa Beach, died Friday of lung cancer at a Kaiser Permanente hospice-care facility in Harbor City, said his wife, Eleanor. Soon after joining KUSC in 1984, Parrish co-hosted a daily arts magazine with Gail Eichenthal on the Olympic Arts Festival. “He was intensely involved in the work ...

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Robert Grahams Legacy is an Open Door

Source: Michael Ricci
January 8, 2009

Artists, civic leaders, celebrities pay tribute to Robert Graham At his funeral, artists,family, friends and dignitaries pass through the cathedral entry that he created.

A hushed throng of artists, arts patrons and civic leaders joined friends and family of the late sculptor Robert Graham at a funeral Mass on Wednesday morning at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels. Filing through the cathedrals Great Bronze Doors, which Graham considered his greatest public commission, the crowd came to mourn the ...

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Ballet Studio Transports Urban Kids to Another World

Source: Michael Ricci
January 8, 2009

The City of Angels Ballet offers free classical ballet training to hundreds of children from some of Los Angeles' toughest neighborhoods.

The Sugarplum Fairy, sweat glistening on her brow, performed the same sequence of steps over and over across the polished wood floor, looking by turns euphoric and miserable. Sprawled next to the piano stretching their legs, the Garcia sisters watched and waited for their chance to dance. The four girls, ages 6 to 15, make the long car trek ...

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Marco Benevento Announces West Coast Tour Dates / Yoshi's Residency

Source: Calabro Music
January 8, 2009

MARCO BENEVENTO Announces February Residency at Yoshi's Oakland Plus Additional West Coast Tour Dates

Special guests including Scott Amendola (Nels Cline Singers), Andrew Barr (Land Of Talk), Billy Martin (Medeski, Martin & Wood), Reed Mathis, Jeff Parker (Tortoise), Joe Russo (The Duo), Skerik and more.

Brooklyn, NY - Marco Benevento will call Northern California home in February when he hosts a four week residency at Yoshi's in Oakland. Supporting his new release, Me Not Me (available February 3 from The ...

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