San Antonio, Texas, is home to the greatest concentration of Catholic missions in North America, including The Alamo, the state’s first mission dating to 1718. The most visited historic landmark in Texas was also a fort and the site of a battle that played a pivotal role in the state’s dramatic history.

San Antonio Missions

In the 18th century, the government of Spain established Catholic missions in the American southwest, in an attempt to exert control and expand its influence in the region. The Spanish Crown looked upon the natives as potential subjects and saw the missions as a way to convert as many of them as possible to Catholicism.

But the native tribes in what is now east Texas showed little interest in what Spain had to offer. So in 1731, the missions there were relocated westward to the San Antonio River, where, according to the U.S. National Park Service, the hunter-gatherer tribes proved “more receptive” to the Spanish message. Upon entering a mission, tribal members were expected to give up their traditional life, accept a new religion and pledge loyalty to a distant and unseen king.

Most of the missions lasted as fully functional religious sites for six decades.

A perfect union

National parks traveler Mikah Meyer, who’s on a quest to visit all of the more than 400 sites within the U.S. National Park Service, described the relationship between the Spanish government and its Catholic priests as “a perfect marriage.”

“The Crown of Spain wanted to expand the territory and the Catholic priests wanted to help spread [Catholicism], so within that, it was kind of a magical partnership,” he said. “So these mission sites preserve a lot of that heritage.”

Today the National Park Service operates the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park, which helps preserve four of the five missions — San José, Concepción, San Juan and Espada. They were added to the list of national parks in 1978 under then-President Jimmy Carter.  

Meyer traveled on the scenic Mission Hike and Bike Trail that follows the San Antonio River and links all five sites. “Each of these mission sites tells part of the story in a different way, depending on how much of the site has been preserved,” he remarked.

“The outlying walls and buildings showcase where the religious figures would have lived, where the students would have lived who were being taught by the missionaries, and a lot of what the daily life would have looked like for these early Spanish colonizers,” he added.

And what life must have been like for Native Americans under Spanish rule, he noted.

“Some people would say they stole their culture from them. Other people would say they provided a means for survival in a changing world that was no longer nomadic and that was becoming agricultural,” he said.

 

“What’s really incredible about these sites are how well intact and preserved the churches are,” he said. “Most at least have their chapel still maintained.” In fact, all four of the churches remain active parishes, which means services are held in them every week.

The heart of San Antonio

Mission San Antonio de Valero, more commonly known as The Alamo, was established by the Franciscans in 1718. It is not a unit of the National Park Service but owned by the state of Texas and is a National Historic Landmark. The 3-century-old compound was a mission from 1718-1793, a fort from 1803-1835 and a battlefield from 1835-1836.

Many consider The Alamo the most enduring symbol of independence in Texas.

Remember The Alamo!

The historic compound is best known as the site of a 1836 battle that marked a turning point in the state’s history. At the time, Texas was a province of Mexico, and colonists (primarily from the United States) grew resentful of increasingly centralized Mexican government. On October 2, 1835, they launched a revolution for independence.

On February 23 the next year, Mexican President Santa Anna’s army began a siege of the Alamo Mission and overran it 13 days later, killing all of the defenders — known at the time as Texians. Among the dead were well-known men such as garrison commander William Travis, American pioneer Jim Bowie and Tennessee Congressman Davy Crockett.

The deadly siege motivated many Texians to join the Texian Army. They defeated the Mexican forces the following month at the Battle of San Jacinto, on April 21, 1836, ending the revolution, and starting Texas’ decade-long status as an independent republic, until it joined the United States as the 28th state.

Mission accomplished

Today, the Alamo compound is the state’s most visited landmark — two centuries after Spain lost most of its influence throughout the Americas.

Meyer noted that considering the historic, life-altering events that took place at The Alamo compound, “it’s not that big of a building … but it’s impressive that it’s become such a well-known part of our culture.”

“It really seems like the town has embraced this part of their history and built a lot of their current day infrastructure around it,” he added.

All five missions were designated UNESCO World Heritage sites on July 5, 2015

As he prepared to depart Texas and head west, Meyer remarked how impressed he was by the Lone Star state’s vast landscape and diverse culture.

“It’s so huge that you got a very rich diversity of natural landscapes, and with that comes a rich diversity of history,” he said.

The national parks traveler invites you to join him as he continues his journey across the American southwest by visiting his website, Facebook and Instagram.

 
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A hacker claims to have stolen the upcoming season of Netflix’s hit series “Orange Is The New Black,” and is demanding that the video streaming service pay an unspecified ransom to prevent all the new episodes from being prematurely released online.

 

The hacker, operating under the name The Dark Overlord, has purportedly uploaded the first episode to an illegal file-sharing service. The Associated Press could not legally confirm the authenticity of that uploaded file.

 

New episodes of “Orange” are scheduled for official release June 9.

Vendor suffered breach 

Netflix said that a small production vendor that works with several major TV studios had suffered a breach. The Los Gatos, California, company described it as an “active situation” that’s being investigated by the FBI and other authorities.

 

Pirated copies of “Orange” could dent Netflix’s subscriber growth and the company’s stock price.

 

In the ransom note, The Dark Overlord claimed to have stolen series from other studios, too, by breaking into a single company. The purported hacker promised to also release those titles unless ransoms are paid.

Rumors for months

Rumors of a massive leak of Hollywood films and TV episodes have been circulating online for months, fed by purported screenshots of the footage and a copy of a proposed deal to delete the stolen material in return for tens of thousands of dollars in electronic currency.

 

When the AP contacted The Dark Overlord in February, the hacker said the purloined video wouldn’t be made publicly available after all, making the far-fetched claim that “no one really (cares) about unreleased movies and TV show episodes.”

 

It’s not clear what triggered The Dark Overload’s renewed ransom demands.

 

Netflix is counting on “Orange” to help it add 3.2 million subscribers from April through June. That’s substantially higher than the company’s average gain of 1.8 million subscribers in the same period over the past five years.

 

Whenever Netflix’s quarterly subscriber gains fall shy of management’s projections, the company’s stock usually plunges. 
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The sprawling American investigation of bribery and corruption in international soccer has reached into Asia and claimed the first guilty plea from a senior official in the new FIFA leadership.

A member of the FIFA Audit and Compliance Committee, Richard Lai of Guam, was provisionally suspended Friday by the FIFA ethics committee after admitting to taking about $1 million in bribes, including from a “faction” of Asian officials buying influence among voters.

The Asian Football Confederation, where he is a long-time executive committee member, also “provisionally suspended Richard Lai from football with immediate effect.”

Lai, a United States citizen and president of Guam’s soccer federation since 2001, plead guilty in Brooklyn federal court on Thursday. The FIFA ethics committee typically imposes life bans on officials who plead guilty.

The AFC official admitted to two counts of wire fraud conspiracy in connection with multiple schemes to accept and pay bribes to soccer officials.

Lai’s case marks a stunning step forward in the American federal investigation, which had indicted or taken guilty pleas from more than 40 people and marketing agencies linked to soccer in the Americas since 2015.

The latest plea reaches deep into Asian soccer for the first time and involves an official who retained his position monitoring FIFA’s multi-billion dollar income and spending in the transition from former president Sepp Blatter to his successor Gianni Infantino.

Infantino praised U.S. law enforcement agencies Friday and promised cooperation from his Zurich-based organization.

“I would like to thank the American authorities for their continued efforts to stamp out corruption from football,” the FIFA president said in a statement. “I am happy to confirm once again, that FIFA will provide whatever assistance is needed by the U.S. and any other authorities around the world.”

FIFA, former senior officials including Blatter, and its hosting awards for World Cups from 2006 to 2022 are variously under investigation in the U.S., Switzerland, Germany and a French case which was confirmed Thursday.

Lai’s 90-day interim ban by the FIFA ethics committee prevents him taking part in the world soccer body’s audit panel meeting on May 8 in Manama, Bahrain. Also that day, Asian soccer federations meet in the city to elect delegates to the FIFA Council.

Lai also pleaded guilty to failing to disclose foreign bank accounts and agreed to pay more than $1.1 million in forfeiture and penalties. The plea was entered before U.S. District Judge Pamela K. Chen.

Bridget M. Rohde, an Acting U.S. Attorney, announced the guilty plea and said it “marks another important step in our ongoing effort to root out corruption in international soccer.”

“The defendant abused the trust placed in him as a soccer official in order to line his own pockets. The defendant’s breach of trust was particularly significant given his position as a member of the FIFA Audit and Compliance committee, which must play an important and independent role if corruption within FIFA is to be eliminated.”

According to the criminal information to which Lai pleaded guilty, he received more than $850,000 in bribes between 2009 and 2014 from a faction of soccer officials in the Asian region in exchange for using his influence as a soccer official. The cash was intended to advance the interests of the faction that bribed him, including by helping officials in that faction identify other officials to offer bribes.

A U.S. Department of Justice news release did not identify details of the faction buying influence.

Lai also received $100,000 in bribes in 2011 from an official of the AFC who was then running for the FIFA presidency, in exchange for Lai’s vote and support in the then-upcoming FIFA presidential election.

Mohamed bin Hammam, the AFC president who was running against Blatter in that FIFA election, was later banned for life from soccer by FIFA.
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Films focusing on America’s broken education system, the power of independent journalism, and the Syrian refugee crisis are just some of the highlights of this year’s Filmfest DC. 

For more than 30 years, the annual event has been showcasing thought-provoking movies from around the world to a discerning audience in the U.S. capital, promoting discussion and debate. This spring, April 20-30, the festival celebrates its 31st anniversary with 80 selected films.

Tony Gittens, founder and head of the Washington, DC International film Festival, came to VOA to talk about this year’s offerings. 

Heightened issues

“These are films that look at issues that have been heightened with the new presidential administration [in the U.S.,]” he said.

He cites as examples films that examine the U.S. educational system, which according to the documentary Backpack Full of Cash, is suffering. Gittens says the film looks at the importance of public schools and throws light on the commercialization of education.

Another film that focuses on the United States is the documentary All Governments Lie, by Canadian filmmaker Fred Peabody. The film traces the history of “free, independent journalism and its significance to the pursuit of truth and preservation of democracy.”

Broad range

Throughout the year, Gittens visits international festivals like Cannes and Toronto to select films that reflect political, social and economic topics across the world. He says one of the advantages of an international film festival is that it also brings a foreign perspective to an American audience.

“We have a film from Bulgaria called The Good Postman, looking at immigration from a European perspective.” The documentary by Bulgarian filmmaker Tonislav Hristov, looks at people who live in an economically depressed village and have to decide, as Syrians enter their small community, how to deal with illegal migration. Is it going to help them and their economy, or is it going to hurt them in some way?

Gittens says the festival attracts 16,000 people into local movie theaters, as well as embassies and museums, which host films every spring. Many of these people work for think tanks, are political decision-makers, and generally are a politically involved audience.

Influencing the influencers

“Washingtonians spend a lot of time looking at TV news, reading the newspaper, and when we gather for social events after a while, a few pleasantries, politics come up. It is really hard to avoid that here,” he said. 

So when a harrowing documentary, such as Last Men in Aleppo by Firas Fayyad is screening in town, it may not only influence how people see the war in Syria, but it might effect change, based on what people of influence may sit through [during] this two-hour experience of human rights violations on Syrian civilians by the Assad regime.

The festival also offers a variety of films that look at social and cultural displacement from the viewpoint of the ethnic communities that exist as islands within other cultures. One example is A Wedding by Stephan Streker. This French-Pakistani production deals with the values of a Pakistani family living in France and ends in tragedy when one of the daughters chooses a new way of life over tradition.

One of the most visually impressive films in this year’s festival is Human. Photographer and filmmaker Yann Arthus-Bertrand uses breathtaking cinematography to deliver a film about humanity, weaving a picture of vast landscapes, the world as seen from up high with mankind dwarfed in it.

Arthus-Bertrand interviews people from all walks of life. 

“It’s about the world, the whole planet, the environment, people’s social needs, economic needs and interests showing how in a way we are different, but in fundamental ways we are very similar,” Gittens said.

Economic engine 

Filmfest DC’s leader says that on average, he watches 350 films a year to select the final 80 to bring to Washingtonians. He says throughout the 31 years he’s been doing this, it is a very rewarding process and the films are appreciated. 

The festival also has become an economic engine for the city, Gittens added. Thousands of people from the metro area and the U.S. come to the nation’s capital to attend the festival, filling up Washington restaurants, creating seasonal jobs, and providing a good time.
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For over 30 years, Filmfest DC has been bringing thought-provoking movies from all over the world to a discerning audience in the U.S. capital, promoting discussion and debate. This spring, the festival is celebrating its 31st anniversary with 80 selected films. VOA’s Penelope Poulou has more.
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This is the Top Five Countdown! We’re hangin’ with the five most popular songs in the Billboard Hot 100 Pop Singles chart, for the week ending April 29, 2017.

It turns out that lighting does strike twice in the same place, because we get a Top Five debut for the second consecutive week.

Number 5: The Chainsmokers & Coldplay “Something Just Like This”

Let’s start in fifth place, where The Chainsmokers and Coldplay hold with “Something Just Like This.”

Coldplay just grabbed two nominations for this year’s Ivor Novello Awards. Chris Martin & Company are nominated twice in the PRS For Most Performed Work category – they earned it for “Adventure Of A Lifetime” and “Hymn For The Weekend.” They’ll square off against Adele, with “When We Were Young.” Named for the famous Welsh composer and actor, the Ivor Novello awards will be handed out on May 18 in London.

 

Number 4: Harry Styles “Sign of The Times”

Let’s keep it in the U.K. for this week’s big debut: Harry Styles opens in fourth place with “Sign Of The Times” – the lead single from Harry’s first solo album, dropping on May 12.

Harry co-wrote this song with Jeff Bhasker, who won the 2016 Grammy for Non-Classical Producer of the Year. He’s worked with everyone from Jay Z to the Rolling Stones. Harry’s album has a lot of buzz behind it, and he says he will go on tour.

Number 3: Kendrick Lamar “Humble”

Kendrick Lamar steps back a slot to number three with “Humble,” from his smash hit album Damn.

Kendrick headlined for two successive weekends at the Coachella festival, and now fans can await his North American headlining tour. It starts July 12 in Glendale, Arizona. Travis Scott and D.R.A.M. will be the opening acts.

Number 2: Bruno Mars “That’s What I Like”

Bruno, Bruno…make up your mind. He’s sold more than 26 million albums, but Bruno Mars just can’t make that last jump: “That’s What I Like” this week returns to its chart high of second place.

Bruno’s currently on tour in the United Kingdom, and last week stopped by the Beatles’ old stomping ground, Abbey Road Studios in London. He says he didn’t use that famous zebra crossing, but it was a temptation.

Number 1: Ed Sheeran “Shape of You”

If you’re tempted to think we have a new singles champ, think again: Ed Sheeran remains your countdown king with “Shape Of You.”

As of April 6, this was the best-selling song of 2017 in the U.S., moving 1.7 million copies. It’s also the only song to have surpassed the million-seller mark so far this year.

We get a whole new lineup next week, so be sure and drop by.
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Oscar-winning U.S. film director Jonathan Demme, who terrified audiences and also made them laugh, died Wednesday in New York at 73.

His family said Demme suffered from cancer of the esophagus.

Demme may be considered one of the most eclectic directors in Hollywood history — directing rousing comedies, horror, concert films and emotional dramas.

His 1991 thriller Silence of the Lambs featured Anthony Hopkins as a cannibalistic murderer with a terrifying mask who is restrained in a cage.

The film and Demme’s close-ups of the criminal haunted audiences and won five Oscars, including one for Demme.

He followed it in 1993 with Philadelphia, starring Tom Hanks as a lawyer dying from AIDS. The film is considered to be a landmark in the way gays are portrayed and the seriousness of the AIDS epidemic.

Critics called Demme’s 1984 concert film starring the Talking Heads, Stop Making Sense, one of the greatest rock films ever made, using techniques that have set the standard for rock documentaries.

Demme also was heavily involved in the Florida-based charity Americans for Immigrant Justice, and his family has requested that fans honor Demme by making contributions to the fund.
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Musician David Byrne, known for his work with the 1980s pop band Talking Heads, wrote an urgent blog post this month. “I just got back from a rally at City Hall,” he said, referring to a New York City rally to support arts funding. “I spoke very briefly, making the economic and social argument that arts funding benefits the economy and creates jobs way in excess of the amount invested.”

Byrne and others at the rally were protesting a budget request by the White House for Congress to eliminate funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

While the Trump administration has said little beyond the budget proposal itself, conservative commentator George Will and others have made the case. Will wrote in The Washington Post last month that the arts mainly benefit the wealthy, and that the wealthy will support the arts regardless of federal help.

In addition, he said NEA funding, which goes to all 435 congressional districts in the United States, supports projects he does not consider art. The NEA, he said, “defines art democratically and circularly. Art is anything done by anyone calling himself or herself an artist, and an artist is anyone who produces art.”

 

The prospect of losing their funding is forcing arts organizations to pull out all the stops to show what good the arts do, beyond the fancy doors of museums and music auditoriums. And they question what good it would do to eliminate agencies whose spending combined makes up less than 1 percent of the national budget.

Byrne, the pop musician, said in his blog post: “Investment in the arts doesn’t cost us money — it MAKES us money!”

Attracting funds

The NEA says its budget appropriation for 2016 was $147.9 million, about .004 percent of the federal budget. It says its contributions to local arts institutions resulted in the leveraging of up to $9 million in private and other public funds.

 

Brad Erickson of Theatre Bay Area, a group representing 300 theater companies in the San Francisco area, clarified the issue in comments to The San Francisco Chronicle last month: “Nobody is getting enough from the NEA to keep the lights on and the rent paid. An NEA grant attracts other money. A dollar from the NEA attracts another $8 in private and local funding.”

The advocacy group Americans for the Arts studies the economic growth that the arts foster in the communities they serve. The group reported that in 2014, arts and culture represented 4.2 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product — a larger share, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, than transportation, tourism or construction.

Further, the NEA says 40 percent of the funding it doles out goes to organizations and activities in high-poverty neighborhoods, where arts education can matter the most.

 

Wolford McCue, president and CEO of the Arts Community Alliance in Dallas, told VOA that studies have found how important arts activities can be to an individual education.

“Young adults who have been engaged with the arts graduate from high school, junior college and college at a significantly higher rate than those not engaged in the arts,” he said. “Significantly more are gainfully employed, pay taxes, vote and volunteer in their community.”

Controversial content

One argument against arts funding persists from the 1980s, when NEA funding went to a venue hosting an art show of provocative photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe — an artist whose name is now synonymous with controversy. His sexually charged work set off a nationwide debate about obscenity and the role of public funding.

Those who defended Mapplethorpe’s work said he was entitled to free speech. Critics said federal dollars should not be used to support work that some people find obscene.

And that, some arts activists say, may be at the root of the issue. While the arts may look like an extravagance to some, others say shutting off arts funding amounts to stifling speech.

PEN, a writers organization focused on free speech, is circulating an online petition advocating for the NEA and its sister organizations. “Eliminating these vital agencies would lessen America’s stature as a haven for free thinkers and a global leader in humanity’s shared quest for knowledge,” it says.

Support in France

A group of French filmmakers also has rallied in support of keeping U.S. federal arts funding alive, saying defunding the NEA is “muffling diversity” because art enables people on the margins of society to tell their stories.

And in an op-ed piece in The New York Times last month, Eve Ewing, a sociologist at the University of Chicago, said, “Artists play a distinctive role in challenging authoritarianism. Art creates pathways for subversion, for political understanding and solidarity among coalition builders.

“Art teaches us that lives other than our own have value.”
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In some of the lowest performing elementary and middle schools in the U.S., students are learning in an unconventional way. 

 

“I like to act and I like to sing and I like to dance,” said 10-year-old Kayla Driakare, whose teachers at Florence Griffith Joyner Elementary School are incorporating much of what she loves doing into the everyday curriculum.

 

Her school is a part of a national program called Turnaround Arts, and is an initiative started by former first lady Michelle Obama.It aims to help improve low performing schools through the arts.

 

For Driakare and her classmates, their school is a safe haven from life outside its walls.The students at Florence Griffith Joyner Elementary are from Watts, a neighborhood in Los Angeles known for its gang violence.

 

“High crime, high poverty, very multigenerational families in public housing. There’s gun violence. We see a lot of helicopters and we have lockdowns regularly and so, the thing is, all associated with poverty – that really traumatized students, so many of our students come to school with symptoms of post-traumatic stress,” explained school principal Akida Kissane Long.

 

She remembers when she first started at the school five years ago, there was “willful disobedience, primarily fighting (and) destruction of school property.”

 

Long said the suspension rate was “267 suspensions on record and (there were) 1,167 classroom suspensions.“

 

The school performed in the lowest 5% of the state and qualified for the Turnaround Arts program, a public-private partnership led by the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities and managed by the D.C.-based John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

 

It is one of 68 schools in the U.S. participating in the program.Teachers receive special training, and the arts are incorporated into all the subjects.Turnaround Arts schools also partner with professional musicians and actors who work with the students. Among the names are Yo-Yo Ma, Sarah Jessica Parker, Elton John and Cameron Diaz. 

 

“The children were so excited and have been so excited because it’s not just about – “Go to the board. Do the problem. Turn the page. Read the book.’It’s about acting and impersonating artists and historic figures, and acting out the water cycle and becoming a butterfly that goes from caterpillar through the cocoon to an expansive beautiful winged insect,” said Long.

 

On Thursdays, dedicated teachers in music and art give lessons. 

 

 “Art is fun. You get to draw what you draw and you get to draw something that you really like,” said an excited Driakare.

 

Only in the first year of a 3-year program, Long is already seeing results.

 

 “We’ve probably suspended one kid this year. That’s amazing. Parents are getting phone calls to come to family portraiture night and come to family arts night, and it’s not just the naughty calls home. It’s for them to come and learn more about what their children are learning.So our parent engagement goes up,” Long said.

 

Decreased disciplinary actions, increased attendance and improved academic achievement are occurring nationwide in a 3-year program evaluation of pilot schools.From 2011 to 2014, the study found a 22.55% improvement in math proficiency and 12.62% improvement in reading proficiency in the Turnaround Arts pilot schools.The study also found Turnaround Arts schools performed better than comparable schools that received special grants for school improvement.

 

At a time when President Donald Trump is proposing cutting the budget for the arts, and arts education is being deemphasized as policy makers push for more focus on math and science in U.S. education, Long is making a case for a more holistic approach.

 

 “Art speaks to everyone. Arts isn’t a set aside. It is part of what makes the curriculum rich and exciting and motivating.” Long added, “Because the arts is so universal and speaks across every culture and every language, every kid has an opportunity to access the highest levels of the curriculum because they had it delivered in a way that they could understand.”

 

At the end of the 3-year program, Long is asking the school district to turn this school into a visual and performing arts magnet school so it can get funding from the district to continue its focus on the arts, and allow more students to experience learning through a more creative approach.
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President Trump’s proposed cuts to the federal budget for the arts is creating concern that it may impact a program started by former first lady Michelle Obama that is showing signs of success. Turnaround Arts gets some funding from federal tax dollars, and it helps some of the nation’s lowest performing schools improve learning in all educational subjects. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee reports from Los Angeles.
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In upstate New York, John Lundemo is making a living by making high end swords. He carves each sword with a distinctive style of his own, a style he developed over the years. Inspiration for his creativity comes from different places. And as Faiza Elmasry tells us, that’s what makes him a sword master. VOA’s Faith Lapidus narrates.
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Pope Francis made a surprise appearance at a TED talk conference on Tuesday, urging powerful leaders “to act humbly” and said he hoped technological innovation would not leave people behind.

The 18-minute video was filmed in Vatican City and broadcast to the audience at the annual TED 2017 conference in Vancouver.

“The more powerful you are, the more your actions will have an impact on people, the more responsible you are to act humbly,” said the pontiff, while seated at a desk.

“If you don’t, your power will ruin you, and you will ruin the other.”

WATCH: Pope delivers TED Talk

The comments echoed Francis’ frequent themes to not ignore the plight of immigrants, the poor and other vulnerable people. Speaking in Italian with subtitles, Francis urged solidarity to overcome a “culture of waste” that had affected not only food but people cast aside by economic systems that rely increasingly on  automation.

“How wonderful would it be if the growth of scientific and technological innovation would come along with more equality and social inclusion,” he said.

TED Talk lectures have grown in popularity, having been viewed cumulatively over 4.6 billion times since going online in 2006 (www.ted.com).

Other speakers slated to appear at the annual conference this week include tennis superstar Serena Williams and entrepreneur Elon Musk.
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The Grammy Museum is putting rare Ella Fitzgerald memorabilia on display for what would have been the singing legend’s 100th birthday.

The museum’s “Ella at 100: Celebrating the Artistry of Ella Fitzgerald” exhibition includes the first Grammy Award  that Fitzgerald won — the first awarded to an African-American woman — as well as some of her gowns, sheet music and personal telegrams.

Fitzgerald died in 1996 at 79 from complications with diabetes and left few possessions beyond personal notes, but the exhibit puts a focus on what made Fitzgerald a star — her voice.

Her voice is the key

Grammy Museum curator Nwaka Onwusa says she wants visitors to be captivated by her singing, so the exhibit includes video and audio of her early performances with jazz greats Count Basie or Duke Ellington.

The exhibit is one of several celebrations of Fitzgerald’s birthday on Tuesday. New York City declared it Ella Fitzgerald Day and the Smithsonian has also opened a special exhibit, while Starbucks stores in the United States played her music.

 

“Ella Fitzgerald’s is probably the single most important voice in American history,” said recording artist Miles Mosley. “If you’re going to start with any song before 1970, her version is the one you start from. That’s the ground floor. That is the most representative version of what the composer themselves wished their songs would sound like.”

Performed in many styles

Over the course of her career, she sang swing, bebop, pop, jazz.  Among her best-known works are a 1938 novelty smash, “A-Tisket, A-Tasket,” which she co-wrote, and a series of eight album sets, each dedicated to an American songwriter or songwriting team. In addition to being best sellers, those albums helped establish the long-play record as a platform for deeper, more serious musical exploration.

Twenty-plus years after Fitzgerald’s death, the rave reviews keep pouring in.  

 

Celebration of Fitzgerald’s 100th actually began March 31, as Dianne Reeves held a Fitzgerald tribute concert at the Library of Congress, which serves as home to Fitzgerald’s personal library. A day later, Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, which has long hosted a Fitzgerald exhibit, opened a new display, “First Lady of Song: Ella Fitzgerald at 100,” kicking off Jazz Appreciation Month.

Onwusa said Fitzgerald’s exhibit was not an easy display to put together, noting that the relatively new Grammy Museum, which opened in 2008, could not compete with the long-established Smithsonian and Library of Congress, which have long been collecting Fitzgerald memorabilia.

Gowns are a key attraction 

But the Los Angeles-based Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation and Fitzgerald estate came through with enough items to make for an attraction, including gowns Fitzgerald wore in performance, rare photographs, sheet music, newspaper articles, concert programs. Securing performance footage proved more challenging, but was critical for Onwusa.

“When you come to Ella at 100, immediately we want visitors to be captivated by her voice,” she explained. “That’s what draws you to Ella.”

To that end, there are viewing and listening stations, where exhibit visitors can watch and hear Fitzgerald performing in various points in her career. She was an active professional performer for some 65 years, going in semi-retirement in 1994, after having both of her legs amputated below the knee due to the effects of the diabetes.

‘100 Songs for a Centennial’

 

For those just being introduced to Fitzgerald, Verve/UMe has just released a career-spanning primer, the four-CD set “100 Songs for a Centennial.” For hardcore fans, there’s the lavish six-album vinyl limited-edition “Ella Fitzgerald Sings The George and Ira Gershwin Song Books,” which is newly packaged with lithographs, a book and a bonus track. Numerous other releases and events are planned throughout the year.

 

But once the celebration ends, it’s fairly clear that the Fitzgerald legacy will continue.

Grammy Museum executive director Scott Goldman singled out a relative newcomer such as Andra Day as a perfect example. “(Here’s) a young African-American artist who is blurring the lines between jazz and soul and R&B.” he noted. “If you listen to Andra Day, you’ll hear a little Ella Fitzgerald. And I think many artists carry that. I think that’s what makes Ella Fitzgerald so special. She lives.”

The exhibit runs through Sept. 10.

 
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When it comes to music and visual arts, American teenagers could use some help.

The National Center for Education Statistics reported Tuesday that in 2016, American eighth graders scored an average 147 in music and 149 in visual arts on a scale of 300. Some 8,800 eighth graders from public and private schools across the country took part in the test, which was part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the Nation’s Report Card.

Acting Commissioner Peggy Carr said the test shows students have a lot to learn in art and music and that no progress has been made since the same test was administered in 2008.

“When I saw the results, clearly there is room for improvement, because clearly there is a lot of content that students weren’t able to interact with correctly,” Carr told The Associated Press.

When asked to listen to George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue,” only about half of the students were able to identify that the opening solo is played on a clarinet. Students who scored 182 were able to label all the eight notes in C major, students who got 150 were able to label one note.

While most students could point to one or two structural differences between two mother-and-child portraits, they usually struggled to explain the technical approach and meaning in an artist’s self-portrait.

“The average student does not know a lot of the content that was asked of them on this assessment,” said Carr. “It was a difficult assessment, a challenging assessment.”

On the bright side, the achievement gap has narrowed between white and Hispanic students from a difference of 32 to 23 points in an average score in music and from 26 to 19 points in arts since the previous test. Girls continued to outperform boys.

The black-white achievement gap, however, remained unchanged. While white students scored an average of 158, black students got 129 on the music test and the margin of difference was similar on the arts portion of the exam — 158 for white students and 128 for black students,

“Every student should have access to arts education to develop the creativity and problem-solving skills that lead to higher success both in and out of school,” said Ayanna Hudson, director of arts education at the National Endowment for the Arts. “Arts education can be especially valuable for our nations’ underserved students, leading to better grades, higher graduation rates and increased college enrollment.”
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The papal almsgiver has made a donation, in the name of Pope Francis, to cover the annual rent for a beach area near Rome used by disabled youths.

The Madonnina, an association that runs the beach establishment near Rome without barriers for the disabled, in a statement Tuesday announced the donation for the area just outside the town of Fiumicino. No money figure was cited.

 

Past charity initiatives by Pope Francis have included day-trips to the beach for homeless people.

 
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Egypt’s tourism levels are still around a third of what they once were and, despite security concerns, Egypt’s tourism minister on Monday insisted the country’s popular Red Sea resorts and Ancient Egyptian sites are a safe choice for travelers.

“We are saying that the tourism sector is safe, the airports are secure, the hotels are secure,” Mohamed Yehia Rashed said, adding that there have not been security breaches at tourist sites.

He said Germany represents the largest visitor market, particularly to Red Sea diving spots around Hurghada and Sharm el-Sheikh, followed by travelers from Saudi Arabia.

While he declined to give tourism figures for the first quarter of 2017, the ministry says that tourism from Arab countries represented around 36 percent of total traffic to Egypt last year. More than half-a-million tourists from Saudi Arabia visited Egypt in 2016, followed by Jordan with 180,000 visitors.

Before Egypt’s 2011 uprising, Italy, the UK and Russia were Egypt’s top markets, in addition to Germany. The uprising, however, decimated Egypt’s multibillion dollar tourism industry, which is a vital pillar of the country’s economy and employs millions of people.

The year before the upheaval, nearly 15 million tourists visited Egypt. Last year, the figure was 5.3 million tourists, according to Chairman of Egypt’s Tourism Authority Hicham al-Demairi.

Both officials spoke to The Associated Press at the Arabian Travel Market convention in Dubai, where Egypt had a large booth advertising its many destinations, hotels and attractions.

Russia, however, continues to ban all flights to Egypt and Egypt’s national carrier is still barred from flying to Russia following the downing of a Russian passenger jetliner in the Sinai Peninsula in 2015 that killed all 224 aboard. A Sinai-based Islamic Stage group affiliate claimed it was behind the incident and Russia says an explosive device was the cause, though the investigation has not yet formally concluded.

Egypt’s currency has also plunged from around 5 pounds to the dollar before the uprising to 18 pounds to the dollar. This, however, has made travel to Egypt more affordable for many tourists, al-Demairi said.

He said Egypt is aiming to draw between 7 and 10 million tourists in 2017. Rather than rely on traditional Western European markets, which comprise the bulk of all tourists to Egypt, al-Demairi said the country is working on new strategies that target Latin American, Eastern European and Asian travelers.

“We don’t want to only depend on coastal and cultural tourism,” he said, referring to tourists who visit Egypt’s pristine beaches and Ancient Egyptian sites in Cairo, Luxor and Aswan.

 
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The small wicker doll chair was a modest toy, but it meant the world to Louise Lawrence-Israels. A gift for her second birthday, it was the only toy she possessed during the approximately three years she spent hiding from the Nazis in Amsterdam, just five blocks from the house where Anne Frank wrote in her diary.

The chair is one of thousands of artifacts housed in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s new conservation and research center, which opened Monday on the annual memorial day for the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany during World War II.

“It was a big thing for me to actually give the chair, because it was a significant thing,” said Lawrence-Israels, 75, one of about two dozen Holocaust survivors who attended the center’s opening.  “A lot of people can look at it and see how it was for a little child in hiding.”

The David and Fela Shapell Family Collections, Conservation and Research Center, located in the suburbs of the nation’s capital, is a state-of-the-art facility with 103,000 square feet (9,570 sq. meters) for documents and artifacts, with room for expansion.

The center houses thousands of items in eight climate-controlled vaults in a building designed to withstand tornadoes and hurricanes. Its collection includes everyday objects, from children’s toys and clothes to sewing machines used in concentration camps.

Travis Roxlau, director of collections services, said center officials have spent 25 years gathering the items.

“We collect stories, and all of the objects that go along with those stories, because as the surviving generation passes on, these are going to be the objects that are left to help us tell the history of the Holocaust,” Roxlau said.

Survivors say the center’s holdings are critical to preserving the reality of the Holocaust.

“I think the most important thing is to make sure that the memory of the Holocaust isn’t forgotten,” said Alfred Munzer, 75, who donated a silver teething ring that went with him at the age of nine months when he was put into hiding with a Dutch-Indonesian family in the Netherlands in 1942. He also donated two small photographs of him that his mother kept hidden while she was confined in concentration camps.

Munzer, of Washington, D.C., said the center and its artifacts will serve “as a lesson to the world as to where hate can lead to.”

Lawrence-Israels, of Bethesda, Maryland, noted that she and other Holocaust survivors are “not going to be here forever, and once we’re not here anymore the museum and this institution will speak for us.”

“This is the only evidence that we leave behind, and with the climate today it’s important that people see that this was real,” Lawrence-Israels said.

Scholars and researchers will have access to materials in the facility. A reading room is scheduled to open in the next year. The museum also is in the process of making documents and images available online.
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Nine years after his death at age 28, audiences are seeing a different side of Australian actor Heath Ledger through the lens of his own camera.

Documentary “I Am Heath Ledger” uses thousands of hours of self video shot by Ledger, as well as his art work and music videos, to paint a portrait of the young actor who took Hollywood by storm in roles like “Brokeback Mountain” and “The Dark Knight.”

The film also seeks to counteract the lingering perception that Ledger was severely depressed when he accidentally overdosed on painkillers, anxiety and insomnia medication.

“He was super happy and he was loving life. He struggled with some demons, but he wasn’t one to go anywhere but forward,” Ledger’s Hollywood agent Steve Alexander says in the film, which was launched at the Tribeca Film Festival this week.

Rather than dwell on his January 2008 death in New York, the film uses Ledger’s video archives and interviews with his family and closest friends to “celebrate Heath’s life and to tell the story of this multi-faceted artist,” director and producer Derik Murray told Reuters Television.

It portrays Ledger as a force of nature who longed for adventure, was generous with his friends, and whose passions ranged from chess to making music videos. His non-stop energy also meant he rarely slept a full night.

While Ledger’s friends including Naomi Watts and director Ang Lee were interviewed for the film, Michelle Williams’ – Ledger’s former fiance and mother of his daughter Matilda – chose not to take part, said her spokeswoman.

Murray said Williams’ support was integral to the film “but she really didn’t feel she wanted to be in front of the camera.”

Ledger was found dead a few months after the couple split up and shortly after filming his role as the manic Joker in “The Dark Knight,” for which he won a posthumous Oscar.

“There was a lot of conversation and chatter around the fact that his passing was a byproduct of his role as the Joker and that he spiraled down this path and couldn’t pull himself out of it,” said Murray.

But Murray said everyone the filmmakers spoke to said this was untrue. “He had the best time making it… The Joker was a role. He was enthralled by it. He was proud of it.”

“I Am Heath Ledger” will get a one-night showing in 300 U.S. movie theaters on May 3 and premiere on Spike TV on May 17.
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Elton John spent two nights in intensive care with a potentially deadly bacterial infection and has canceled all his concerts for the rest of April and May, his publicist said on Monday.

The British musician, 70, became “violently ill” on a flight home from his recent South American tour, spokeswoman Fran Curtis said in a statement.

The “Rocket Man” singer spent two nights in intensive care in the U.K. and is resting at home after being released on Saturday, the statement said.

The infection was not identified, but the statement said John contracted the “harmful and unusual bacterial infection” during his South American tour, which ended in Chile on April 10.

“Infections of this nature are rare and potentially deadly,” the statement said, adding that his time in intensive care was followed by an “extended stay in hospital.”

John is expected to make a full recovery but has canceled all his concerts in Las Vegas for April and May, as well as a gig in Bakersfield, California, on May 6.

John apologized to fans for disappointing them, adding in a statement: “I am extremely grateful to the medical team for their excellence in looking after me so well.”

He is due to resume performances at a concert in Twickenham, England, on June 3.

John, a Grammy, Oscar and Tony winner for his work in film and theater, is working on a score for a Broadway musical adaptation of the comedy-drama “The Devil Wears Prada.”
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