He has three older brothers: Todd Westbrook (deceased), Jeff Westbrook, and Michael Smart.

(meta data) TITLE: Smart went from 'dead or in jail' to Oklahoma State's selfless general

# Smart went from 'dead or in jail' to Oklahoma State's selfless general

Published 8:51 p.m. ET Jan. 22, 2013 | Updated 10:25 p.m. ET Jan. 22, 2013

Oklahoma State freshman point guard Marcus Smart credits a near-death experience with helping straighten himself up as a youth in Texas.(Photo: Shane Bevel for USA TODAY Sports)

Oklahoma State freshman point guard is a potential NBA lottery pickFamily tragedy sent him into a period of simmering rage and troublemaking as a youthCollege coaches praise Smart for his unselfish style of play and decisionmaking

Six years before Oklahoma State point guard Marcus Smart became one of the nation's most respected college basketball players, he threw rocks at people's heads.

How he blossomed into one of the sport's most humble stars, an unassuming 18-year-old potential NBA lottery pick, was through a journey defined by deep personal loss and self-discovery.

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Rage burned inside him after seeing cancer overtake one older brother and cocaine nearly destroy another.

Anger boiled while confronting a neighborhood south of Dallas he called a war zone amid duplexes.

He desperately sought to inflict others with the pain that incessantly gnawed at his 12-year-old heart.

One night near his home in Lancaster began like so many others, with Marcus and a friend stuffing their pants pockets with rocks and positioning themselves on the second floor of the apartment complex they called The Pinks, looking for a target with a pulse.

Little did Marcus know this would be such a pivotal night in his life.

Spotting a man on a bike in a black hooded sweatshirt, they unleashed rocks and celebrated with high-fives and laughs after – Bam! – the pelting knocked the man to the ground.

But when Marcus looked again, all he saw was the bike.

And all he heard was the thumping of a man racing up the stairwell and a frenzied voice promising to kill him.

Oklahoma State freshman sensation Marcus Smart Fullscreen

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Oklahoma State guard Marcus Smart passes the ball during the first half of his team's game against Kansas State earlier this season in Manhattan, Kan. Charlie Riedel

APFullscreenGonzaga coach Mark Few, left, talks with Oklahoma State guard Marcus Smart following a game in Stillwater, Okla., on Dec. 31.

Smart led Oklahoma State with 23 points but Gonzaga won 69-68.

Brody Schmidt, APFullscreenOklahoma State coach Travis Ford reacts to an official's call in the second half of a game against Oklahoma earlier this season.

Sue Ogrocki, APFullscreenOklahoma State Cowboys guard Marcus Smart (33) looks to drive the ball around Baylor Bears guard Pierre Jackson (55) during the first half of a game earlier this season.

APFullscreenCamellia Smart, mother of Oklahoma State freshman guard Marcus Smart, is shown at her home in Flower Mound, Texas with some of the many balls and trophies her son has won over the years.

Michael is one of two older brothers Marcus grew up with.

The oldest brother, Todd Westbrook, died at the age of 33.

Todd was the older brother of Marcus and died at the age of 33.

Marcus wears the number 33 on his jersey.

Michael Mulvey, for USA TODAY Sports with permission from the Smart familyFullscreen

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Marcus and his friend leaped over the second-story railing, landing hard on the concrete below.

Fueled by adrenaline and fear, Marcus sprinted faster than he ever had on the football field or basketball court, zigzagging through alleyways to an adjacent complex, The Meadows.

Behind Marcus, the footsteps and menacing voice grew louder.

Marcus did not know that the man was a member of the Bloods street gang.

And until he glanced back in the dimly lit roads, he did not know what object the man held in his hand: a loaded gun.

Marcus knew he no longer was the generous kid who as a 4-year-old gave a homeless man his coveted $20 bill, no longer the innocent child who pedaled his bike in cowboy boots to McDonald's for free burgers.

He knew he had devolved into something else, a lost soul perhaps with just seconds left to breathe.

His heart pounding and soaked in sweat, he breathed so uncontrollably he felt like his lungs were locked in a vise.

Marcus heard the ear-splitting sound of four gunshots.

"Ever see 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre'?" Marcus says now.

"Just imagine him that close to you with a chainsaw, that's how close he felt.

All I kept thinking was, Am I going to die?

What is he going to do if he catches me but doesn't shoot me?"

When fans see Marcus play college basketball now, racing up and down the court with an intensity few can rival, there is little evidence of that anger.

Some players in the sport are more talented than Marcus, but few possess such a unique skill set, and even fewer are as reluctant to boast about it.

To Marcus, his statistics are an afterthought; his teammates' statistics matter more.

He deflects attention in an age when most crave it.

"It's his character," says Marcus' best friend and roommate Phil Forte, a friend of Marcus since they were in third grade.

"He plays with a chip on his shoulder, not like a prima donna."

Fran Fraschilla, the ESPN analyst and Dallas resident who has watched Marcus play since the ninth grade, says, "It is very rare you see a young player with the countenance and knowledge of a 10-year NBA player …

If you're going into an alley fight, and you have the Incredible Hulk on your side, you feel pretty good.

(Photo: Michael Mulvey for USA TODAY Sports)

Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim says that by season's end there may not be a more valuable player in the country.

And Oklahoma State coach Travis Ford can recount myriad stories that he finds so unusual, so refreshing in this look-at-me-generation in which many players seek to compile highlight reels.

"For a McDonald's All-American, his approach to the game is like no one I have ever been around," Ford says.

"If you are around him for five minutes, you'd never guess that he is one of the best players in America."

Few know how Marcus became the way he is today.

Says Marcus, "People always ask me, 'How are you so humble?'

When you go through things like I have, there's only one way for you to be.

This is a cold world out there – the world is very cold – and if you don't learn things and understand things, this world can eat you up."

Few know how his childhood fueled his competitiveness and shaped his self-effacing persona.

Marcus says he shared his story with USA TODAY Sports, including many details that he never told close family members, so that other troubled children who have endured the loss of loved ones and hardscrabble environments have a template for success.

"I think about it every day, it's incredible," Marcus says.

"Thank God I had both parents and older brothers.

If I didn't change what I was doing, I would be dead or in jail."

Marcus was bred in a close-knit family that rarely sulked despite tragedy.

There was his mom, Camellia Smart, 58, who goes to dialysis three times a week and who has lived with one kidney since, she says, "a kidney stone ate up the other one" two decades ago.

There's her husband of 38 years, Billy Frank Smart, the 66-year-old biological father of Marcus and Michael Smart.

And there's Todd and Jeff Westbrook, who were born to a different father decades before Michael and Marcus were born.

Smart led Oklahoma State with 23 points but Gonzaga won 69-68.

Camellia, whom the brothers deemed Wonder Woman for her fortitude and work ethic, was the family's heart.

Todd, a second father figure to Michael and Marcus, was its backbone.

Marcus knew that if anyone was destined to play in the NBA, it was Todd, who shot 62 percent from the field one season as a guard for Lancaster High.

By the time Marcus would dribble a basketball all over the home in his boots, he had already heard all the stories from the 1980s that made him idolize Todd.

Marcus knew that when doctors found a tumor behind Todd's eye at 15 years old, his mom felt like "someone took a knife and split my chest in two."

But he knew Todd barely flinched, telling the doctor, "Okay, what do we do next?"

Though the cancer spread to his lungs, then his stomach, Todd always found enough resolve to mentor his brothers.

He showed them how to shave, shake a man's hand and sell themselves in job interviews.

He explained to Michael how to wear a condom.

Even as he turned gaunt and too weak to walk to the bathroom without resting, he often called Michael and Marcus into his bedroom to watch the Discovery or History channels.

"That is what I always admire about him," Marcus says, "that tenacity and that ambition to keep living even though you know you don't have much time."

As a 9-year-old, nothing meant more to Marcus than family.

When Camellia saw he was wearing sneakers with holes in the bottom to school, Marcus shrugged.

When a relative offered to buy him Nikes, he pointed to other $19 sneakers instead.

And in December 2003, when Camellia asked him what he wanted for Christmas, Marcus said one word: "Nothing."

"Seriously, baby, what do you want?" Camellia repeated.

"Momma, I don't want anything," Marcus answered.

"I ask God to bless me and my family to be together for Christmas."

Together with his family for the holidays, Marcus received that gift.

But on Jan. 9, 2004, Marcus' aunt called him and his cousin inside from playing, asked them to sit down and tearfully delivered the news everyone feared: Todd was dying.

Marcus stared at her, gazing at her face, thinking he was dreaming.

Then he sprung up and bolted out the door, slamming it so hard the glass shattered.

His cousin chased him down, wrestling him to the ground while Marcus screamed.

At the hospital, Marcus ran down a long hallway until he spotted the rest of his family, all bawling.

Todd, at 33 years old and after an 18-year battle with cancer, had died.

In Todd's hospital room, among crying relatives still trying to speak to Todd, Marcus walked to the foot of the bed, slowly knelt and touched Todd's foot.

"I have never felt something so cold and so hard in the human body before."

Camellia, tears rushing down her face, picked Marcus up and told him everything would be okay.

Still in disbelief, Marcus walked to the other side of the bed thinking Todd was merely sleeping.

Marcus shook him and yelled, "Todd, wake up!"

Marcus walked to the edge of the bed and placed a gentle kiss on Todd's lips.

Marcus then put his hands in the air, saying, "Todd is just like a butterfly.

Losing Todd was a blow the family struggled to endure.

In their home in DeSoto, Marcus and Michael, sometimes at the same time, could not help but crawl into Todd's bed at night, putting themselves to sleep to that familiar sound of the Discovery Channel.

It was the same room where they would always put a hanger above the door in the shape of a basketball hoop and would join Todd in shooting balled up socks until Todd grew fatigued.

Oklahoma State Cowboys guard Marcus Smart (33) reacts with guard Markel Brown (22) and forward Kamari Murphy (21) during the second half of the team's game against the Virginia Tech Hokies.

Now without Todd, the brothers found a catharsis in surrounding themselves with Todd's memory, his images and sounds.

But Marcus also had other images seared into his mind: his 19-year-old brother Michael, who had been a talented point guard at Lancaster High, spiraling into a world of gangs, drugs and guns.

Michael became affiliated with the Bloods street gang and acted as if he had a death wish.

Michael saw friends accumulate up to $8,000 a week working the streets, driving Mercedes Benzes and '86 Chevys.

They were decked out in gold and diamonds and had oversized flat-screen televisions before much of suburban American owned one.

Marcus watched Michael springboard in that life and nearly drown.

Michael says he made $2,500 per week, selling crack and other drugs and pimping out women.

To protect himself, he says he had at least five firearms: "A .40 and .45 caliber, a TEC-9, an AK-47 and a 12-gauge shotgun."

After they moved to Lancaster, Marcus at times would run to the corner of the 1500 block of Bluegrove Road and make futile attempts to get Michael to come back home.

Undeterred, Marcus would wait up until the wee hours of the morning to make sure Michael – though at times frazzled from drugs – returned home safe.

Marcus, just 10 years old, would sit close to Michael in the near darkness of their home and tell him, "Momma does not need a call at 2 a.m. telling her they found you in jail or six feet under.

Marcus would raise his little hand and wipe away tears from Michael's face.

Looking back eight years later, Marcus says, "We had plenty of nights like that.

I didn't like what he was doing, but he was still my brother and I loved him.

You see that stuff on the news and play the [video] games, and it's like a video game.

When you see it in front of you, it's terrifying."

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Less than a year after Todd's death, Marcus was at an AAU tournament when Camellia relayed him a message that Michael was in the hospital.

During a one-month binge of cocaine abuse, Michael snorted so much on one occasion that he toppled over in the home and hurt his eye.

Gary Westbrook, his uncle who was rendered a paraplegic after being shot in the spine in a carjacking, came off his wheelchair to pound his chest to try to revive him before calling 911.

And soon after, Marcus again was in a long hospital hallway, bracing himself for another ice cold foot to grasp, thinking all the while that he could lose a second brother in the span of a year.

Upon entering the room, his emotions swirled as he saw tubes coming out of Michael.

"I do remember the look in Marcus' eyes," Michael says.

Says Marcus, "He should have been dead, that's how much was in his system."

Michael remembers the doctor telling him, "I'm here to save lives.

If you want to do this to yourself, don't come here.

Michael recovered and went to the altar in church that Sunday.

Though he was not done with street life, he says he never sniffed cocaine again.

He vowed to keep Marcus away from that lifestyle.

And he told gang members to leave Marcus alone or face Michael's wrath of bullets.

"You go down a different path," Michael told Marcus.

People want to call you a punk or different?

I promise you, six years later when you look back, see who is different and who made a difference."

But problems were beginning to fester for Marcus, whose rage simmered.

As a young child, he hardly made a misstep, except when he says he foolishly smoked marijuana the only time in his life, when he was no older than 8.

He says it made him so sick that he had to embarrassingly tell his mom, who took him to the emergency room.

Camellia says Marcus only told her he was sick, not that he smoked pot.

But after losing Todd and nearly losing Michael, while surrounded by classmates flashing gang signs and guns on street corners, Marcus says, "I just felt really lost.

He and friends would steal candy, food and soda from stores.

He uncorked much of his anger on the football field, but his greatest emotional release came from fighting.

He called himself a bully, preying on the weak and strong.

"It feels like if you have a broken arm and you just want to scream," Marcus says of his anger.

"The worst pain you can ever think of, that's exactly how angry I felt.

That's how bad the anger was and exactly how bad I wanted to release it.

I didn't know how to express it beyond fighting."

He looked for any weapons he could find.

He would throw knives and branches at people.

He recalls nearly breaking a kid's neck.

He says he felt like he could have killed someone.

On one occasion, he and a friend were jumped and outnumbered by guys.

Marcus went home and got his dad's .22 caliber pistol.

Michael stopped him at the door before Marcus had the chance to hunt down the kids.

He slammed another kid's head into the concrete.

At one point, the principal called him into his office and told him he was to go to alternative school for 30 days.

"Good behavior and you can get out early."

The night that remains most crystallized in Marcus' mind is when he was running for his life from the man in the black hooded sweatshirt.

He and his friend raced to a trail in the woods they knew well.

They made quick turns and knew a low-hanging branch required them to duck.

The man did not duck, and they heard him get knocked to the ground.

Once home that night, Marcus never closed his eyes.

"My life was almost taken," Marcus says.

From some stupid decision I decided to make, one stupid decision that I felt was good, that I felt was fun, it could have easily taken my life.

"I really don't tell people that story because what would you say?

What would you do if you were in that situation?

It's just not a pretty sight to try to imagine running, literally running for your life."

Marcus never told Michael that the man – an acquaintance of Michael -- shot at him, only that the man tried to beat him up.

Marcus knew that if he had told Michael all the details, Michael might have killed the man.

"If I just keep this to myself, my brother won't get in trouble and I just won't do it anymore.

I would have gone out and somebody might have gotten killed.

And he never told his mother, but at the time she knew he needed help, an escape from that environment.

"I knew I had to do something," she says.

"You know how you know something is wrong, you can feel it.

I've always told my boys, there's nothing too hard to come and talk to me about."

I said, 'Baby, why haven't you told me this before?' " Camellia asked.

" 'Momma, I didn't want to worry you.' "

"I didn't let the gangs rob my other boys, and I was not going to let them rob Marcus," she says.

Marcus took anger management classes, which he says helped a great deal.

And the family moved into a three-bedroom ranch house in Flower Mound, a suburb west of Dallas.

Camellia relied on advice from the family of Phil Forte, Marcus' best friend who lived in Flower Mound, to select a school.

Marcus would see people walking around outside at night and instinctively flinch.

Friends would have to tell him that it was just a man walking his dog.

Marcus now could sit on the family's back porch without hearing gunshots or fighting.

Like he stepped out of the darkness to the light.

Marcus channeled his aggression in football and then in his primary sport, basketball.

Teachers told Camellia how impressed they were that Marcus lacked a sense of entitlement that some other athletes possessed.

When Marcus won trophies or awards, he would quickly put them aside and turn to YouTube to study intricate skills like Kobe Bryant's footwork.

And when the recruiting letters came, he didn't dwell on them, instead hitting the gym with Michael.

Sitting in an Applebee's last week, Michael's eyes welled up as he reflected on Marcus, a younger brother he says he looks up to as if he were an older brother.

Michael says Marcus regularly encourages him to keep his life above board and tells him how proud he is that Michael, who is now 27 and works at a warehouse, gave up selling drugs a few years ago.

"God had me on this Earth for a reason," Michael says.

"And I think that might be the reason – my brother.

He is doing something my mom wanted for all of us, to be successful.

"When (Mom) looks at Marcus, it just brightens up her day.

Todd is gone, but he's living in Marcus.

You have met Todd because you met Marcus.

Back in Camellia's suburban home, which is filled with Marcus' trophies, signed basketballs and Adidas shoes from the McDonald's All-American game, she walked to the fireplace and picked up a team picture of Todd from Lancaster's 1987-1988 season.

Todd returned that senior season despite playing with little more than one eye and helped Lancaster to a No. 2 ranking in the Texas Association of Basketball Coaches' Class 4A poll.

In the picture, Todd wore No. 3, the same number each brother wore in high school.

Each brother has a tattoo in memory of Todd.

Marcus was also interested in wearing the No. 3 at Oklahoma State, but was told it was unavailable because Dan Lawson, who died in the Oklahoma State plane crash of 2001, had worn it.

Marcus instead chose 33 because that was Todd's age when he died.

In Saturday's game against Texas Tech, Marcus scored only three points but didn't care.

Marcus reflects on his life every day, appreciative of how far he has come and determined to always play hard and unselfishly.

He is intent not to let his brother's name go in vain.

He says he has firm control now over his emotions, and his coach, Travis Ford, calls him one of the most genuine players he has been around.

"I don't want to be that person they look at and say, 'He's an A-hole, he's mean,'" Marcus says.

"I want them to look at Marcus Smart and say he's the nicest guy I have ever met.

I don't want to hear any negative things about me.

I'm a reflection of my mom, my brothers and everyone in my family.

How I carry myself is a reflection of how they raised me.

PHOTOS: HOW THE TOP FRESHMEN HAVE FARED THIS SEASON

How the top freshmen fared in college basketball Fullscreen

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Marcus Smart, Oklahoma State (Averaged 15.4 points, 5.7 rebounds, 4.2 assists per game).

Julie Jacobson, APFullscreenBen McLemore, Kansas (Averaged 16.4 points, 5.3 rebounds per game): McLemore is a rarity in college basketball -- a redshirt freshman.

But after sitting out last year while ineligible, McLemore was the Jayhawks' breakout star.

Dean Hare, APFullscreenKyle Anderson, UCLA (Averaged 9.8 points, 8.6 rebounds, 3.5 assists per game): The versatile Anderson might have had the most balanced skill set of any freshman.

Calipari guards cast a long shadow, but Goodwin held his own on an uneven Wildcats team.

James Crisp, APFullscreenNerlens Noel, Kentucky (10.5 points, 9.5 rebounds, 4.4 blocks per game):

Noel's promising freshman season was ended by a torn ACL in his left knee against Florida.

Gary A. Vasquez, USA TODAY SportsFullscreenNik Stauskas, Michigan (11.5 points per game, shoots 44.9% from beyond the arc): Stauskas was the surprise gem of the Wolverines' already-stellar freshmen class.

Sandra Dukes, USA TODAY SportsFullscreen

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Smart is the son of Billy Frank Smart and Camellia Smart, who died of myelodysplastic syndrome on September 16, 2018.


From 1935 to 1945, Cage was married to the musician and composer John Cage and performed in his percussion ensemble throughout their marriage.

(meta data) TITLE: John Cage's genius an L.A. story - Los Angeles Times

Composer John Cage is among the most innovative music figures of the 20th century.

Yet his formative years in the cultural stew of 1920s and '30s L.A. get overlooked.

The composer is among the most innovative music figures of the 20th century.

Timeline | Music | Inspiration | Critic's Notebook | Events

Composer John Cage during his concert held at the opening of the National Arts Foundation, Washington DC,

John Cage was born Sept. 5, 1912, at Good Samaritan Hospital in downtown Los Angeles.

Nor are there plaques anywhere in L.A., Long Beach, Santa Monica or Claremont, cities where Cage grew up, studied and gave his first concerts.

He was, perhaps, the greatest music radical of the 20th century.

His music honored silence along with sound.

He made no distinction between traditional musical sounds and what some call noise.

He embraced, rather than escaped from, messy urban life as well as anarchic nature.

He was controversial, to say the least, but his influence has been, and continues to be, extraordinary.

No one in the last century did more to change the way much of the world now thinks about, makes and consumes art.

Cage lived the last 50 years of his life in New York, personifying the city's avant-garde.

He wrote the music for which he is known there and died in Manhattan in 1992.

But the voluminous Cage literature has underestimated or glossed over the degree to which his revolutionary ideas had their origins in the singular and sometimes outlandish L.A. cultural stew of the '20s and '30s -- a liberating, vibrantly open society where highbrow émigré artists mixed with mystics and movie stars, where artistic and sexual experimentation were not necessarily separate activities.

That may help to explain why cultural capitals on the East Coast and in Europe, Asia and South America are celebrating the Cage centennial far more robustly than is the city of his birth.

Darmstadt, for instance, renamed its central station the John Cage Railway Station this summer during the term of the famous new music courses the German city holds every July.

But with his 100th birthday on Wednesday, this is a moment not only to take back Cage but also to maybe see a little of ourselves reflected in our still often misunderstood native son.

John Milton Cage, Jr., in Los Angeles circa 1918.

A good place to begin is with his disarming laugh.

Cage's magnificent sense of humor -- "I prefer laughter to tears," he often explained -- made him instantly likable.

But that he prided himself on having been born with a sunny disposition is no wonder.

The L.A. of a hundred years ago was a uniquely optimistic city.

An anything-goes boomtown, which included a madcap nascent film business, Los Angeles named its main streets downtown Temple, Charity, Faith and Hope.

In 1913, we were characterized by a New York magazine as a city susceptible to "spiritualists, mediums, astrologists, phrenologists, palmists and all other breeds of esoteric wind-jammers," to say nothing of "mazdaznan clubs, yogi sects, homes of truth, cosmic fluidists, astral planers, Emmanuel movers, Rosicrucians and other boozy transcendentalists."

Hollywood hillside pageants included a Theosophical Society adoration of the East and a 12-part Pilgrimage Play at the sites of the now Hollywood Bowl and John Anson Ford Theatre.

As a student walking to Los Angeles High School in the '20s, Cage would pass by Aimee Semple McPherson's Angelus Temple in Echo Park, where the popular evangelist might don a USC football player's uniform to carry the ball for Christ or dress as a policeman and ride up to the pulpit on a motorcycle to put sin under arrest.

When Cage turned to opera late in his life the result looked something like that.

By using chance operations to make his "Europeras 1 & 2," Cage wound up with situations in which, say, a singer traditionally costumed for a 19th century opera might enter on a jeep.

Idiosyncratic spectacle was, in fact, part of Cage's DNA.

The first one he witnessed was as an infant, but he spoke about it all his life.

On a late spring afternoon in 1913, the tip of a submarine emerged from the bottom of the Long Beach harbor where it had been buried under five feet of mud for 36 hours.

Thousands of spectators let out thunderous cheers.

Nearby factories blasted their whistles.

Three dozen boat launches honked their foghorns.

Take an interactive tour of John Cage's Los Angeles.

That glorious racket was what would now, no doubt, be called Cagean.

Stepping off one of those launches, the mayor of Long Beach walked onto the flat top of the sub and cut the seal with a knife.

Out climbed the sub's inventor and his crew.

They had just broken the world's underwater record by a dozen hours, and the inventor said he felt "dandy."

The event was the top story on the front page of The Times the next morning under the headline: "Comes Up Famous."

A picture shows the young inventor in a bowler hat kissing his stylish wife.

John Milton Cage Sr., was a visionary inventor.

He worked on forerunners of color television, sonar and homeopathic medicine (Cage swore by his dad's "Mist-A-Cold" inhaler).

When he died in 1964, Milton, as he was called, was toying with the idea of space travel based upon gravitation that he felt would show Einstein the error of his ways.

After advertising stock for his submarine company in The Times at a dollar a share, Milton raised $1 million.

But the craft was of no value to the U.S. Navy because his sub released air bubbles revealing its location.

John Jr., an only child, spent his preschool years in Detroit, where Milton taught engineering.

Another fiasco, though, sent the family high-tailing it back to L.A. after Milton invented what was then the world's most powerful airplane engine, so strong that it blew apart its housing and thus also proved useless.

John Cage's reach extended well beyond experimental music:He influenced the Beatles' Paul McCartney and John Lennon and artists in several other genres.

Milton built a Craftsman-style house for his family in Eagle Rock and turned to experimenting with early radio, which caught his son's fancy.

In 1924, 12-year-old John Jr. began a weekly show about the Boy Scouts at KNX, which had been started four years earlier in the bedroom of L.A.'s first disc jockey, Fred Christian.

Cage delivered the local Boy Scout news, played the piano (mostly Grieg) and invited clergy of various denominations to give inspirational talks.

This proved so popular that the Boy Scouts took over the time slot.

Without Cage, though, listenership plummeted and KNX pulled the show off the air.

Cage's first piano teacher was his Aunt Phoebe, his mother's sister.

Phoebe James was a remarkable pedagogue who developed unconventional (that is to say conventionally Cagean) methods of teaching music to children that included jiggling balloons filled with rice and hitting radiators with sticks.

At Los Angeles High School, Cage had another enlightened music teacher, Fannie Charles Dillon, a concert pianist and pioneering female composer who adapted bird calls into her scores.

The 1928 class valedictorian, Cage graduated with the highest scholastic average at the time in L.A. High's history, and he represented his school in an oratorical contest that spring at the Hollywood Bowl.

His winning speech proposed a day of quiet for all Americans.

By being hushed and silent, he said, "we should have the opportunity to hear what other people think."

Nearly a quarter-century later, Cage would shock the musical world with his composition "4'33."

For four minutes and 33 seconds, the performer remains silent, inviting the audience to appreciate sound as an inescapable -- and enjoyable -- aspect of our environment.

Cage entered Pomona College that fall as a theology major, but his interests quickly turned elsewhere.

His enthusiasm for the French artist Marcel Duchamp, who became one of Cage's most significant influences, can be traced to José Pijoan, a Portuguese art professor at Pomona.

Henry Cowell, the innovative California composer who would later become Cage's first important mentor and champion, gave a recital at Pomona, hitting the keyboard with his fists and elbows and directly plucking the piano's strings.

John Milton Cage, Jr., and John H. Gregg: below, William R. Roalfe, Miss Katherin Welborn and Superintendent of Schools Dorsey in a photo that appeared in the Los Angeles Times on December 22, 1927.

Cage discovered the writing of the Indian art theorist Ananda Coomaraswamy -- on which he based his notions about the role of nature and the emotions in his music of the '40s and early '50s -- at Pomona when Coomaraswamy's musician wife, Ratan Devi, visited the campus.

But it was Don Sample, a pretentious Harvard grad and drifter who was hanging around Claremont, who changed Cage's life.

Sample induced Cage to help him curate an art exhibit, and he introduced Cage to the work of James Joyce, a writer who served as a source of inspiration throughout Cage's life.

Cage's decision to drop out of Pomona after his sophomore year and go to Europe was at least in part to meet up with Sample.

Whether they first became lovers in Claremont or in Europe is unclear.

Cage went to Europe thinking himself a writer, but, after a few piano lessons at the Paris Conservatory and a year wandering around Europe and North Africa with Sample, Cage returned to L.A. in 1932 a composer of mathematically constructed scores and also a painter who took his inspiration from squinting at the sun (juvenilia that was either destroyed or lost).

At first Cage and Sample stayed with Cage's parents, disguising their affair.

Thanks to his invention of the electric radio, Milton had been able to afford a large house in Pacific Palisades, but the Depression had by now wiped him out, and the family had been forced to sell all the furniture.

During his early years in New York, he lived in an artfully decorated but unfurnished downtown loft that was famously photographed by New York fashion magazines.

The early '30s was a time when L.A. had begun its transformation from provincial city into a cosmopolitan arts center, much bolstered by the great Russian and German émigré artists who had begun to arrive.

And so, almost laughably, began the 20-year-old Cage's own transformation.

Late in 1932, Cage, Sample and a high school friend of Cage's, Harry Hay (who would become a prominent gay activist), put on Cage's first concert at the Santa Monica Bay Woman's Club, where Cage's mother was a member.

A cross section of John Cage compositions: "Credo in Us," "Sonatas and Interludes," "4'33'" and "Atlas Eclipticalis" are among the works that show the composer's range.

Photo: John Cage prepares a piano in the mid-1950s.

For a song that Cage had written to a text by Aeschylus about the death of Xerxes, Hay donned white blankets upon which colored patterns were projected by a fluorescent light source that Milton rigged up.

Once again, Milton didn't quite anticipate the consequences of his invention, and the projector got so hot that the velum upon which the designs were painted began to run.

The ladies in the audience were bewildered.

As the family fortunes continued to fall, the Palisades house was sold, and the Cages moved downtown.

John's mother, Lucretia, took a job as women's club editor at The Times.

Under the byline Crete Cage, she wrote more than 1,600 columns that chronicled her times and her town by reporting on the daily speakers at the city's many clubs.

These were often national figures and their topics were social, political and artistic issues.

Not only did Crete instill a concern for society in her son that became the essence of his thought, but he was greatly influenced by her elegantly clear writing style.

Cage and Sample moved into an auto court in Santa Monica, and also lived briefly in one of the rooms the architect Rudolph Schindler lent out to artists in his famed house on Kings Road in West Hollywood.

There Cage met German art dealer Galka Scheyer, a patron of the Expressionist painters she had dubbed the Blue Four (which included Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky).

Through Scheyer, Cage heard about pianist Richard Buhlig, the first important musician to take an interest in the young composer.

Though now forgotten, the Chicago-born pianist was also the first to play a complete cycle of Beethoven's 32 piano sonatas in L.A. and the first to record Bach's "Art of the Fugue."

Buhlig, who was a student of Hinduism and Buddhism, is the one who planted the seed in Cage that he needed to do something about his obviously large ego and get beyond his likes and dislikes so he could be open to new discoveries.

He told Cage that listening with preconceived notions was listening with opinion.

(Johan Hagemeyer / Online Archives of California / The Bancroft Library).

And he sent Cage to Henry Cowell, who then prepared Cage to study with Arnold Schoenberg.

The Austrian composer had recently emigrated to L.A. from Berlin to escape Nazi persecution, and Cage took his courses at USC, UCLA and Schoenberg's Brentwood home.

Most of the time Cage spent with Schoenberg was devoted to traditional harmony and counterpoint exercises, rather than learning the 12-tone technique that Schoenberg had invented to do away with conventional harmony.

On his own, Cage drafted a collective of bookbinders (with whom he shared a house in Santa Monica) into a percussion ensemble and wrote pieces for them that applied Schoenberg's structural principals to rhythmic cells.

Schoenberg, however, thought this of little interest.

Fed up with repeatedly having to study the composer's harmony textbook, "Harmonielehre," Cage dropped out of Schoenberg's UCLA class in 1936 after having devoted himself to the master for nearly two years.

Still the young composer continued to, as he put it, worship Schoenberg like a god.

He took away from Schoenberg the idea that a composer always needed some kind of system.

In order to become musically focused during his studies with Schoenberg, Cage realized that he needed to greatly simplify his personal life, which had become promiscuous.

He continued his relationship with Sample, and both had other male partners as well.

But Cage had also been involved in a passionate love affair with Schindler's wife, Pauline, who was 19 years his senior.

She had separated from her husband and was living in Ojai.

Then one day Xenia Andreyevna Kashevaroff walked into an arts and craft shop downtown that Crete ran during the years she wrote her Times columns.

The daughter of a Russian Orthodox priest in Alaska, Kashevaroff was a beauty who had been photographed nude by Edward Weston and had been part of John Steinbeck's circle in Salinas.

When John saw her, it was, he said, love at first sight.

For a while Cage juggled all three lovers, turning to a not-particularly receptive Pauline for advice about how to woo Kashevaroff.

In the end, Cage and Kashevaroff drove to Yuma, Ariz., and got married on June 7, 1935.

His mother put the announcement in The Times.

Marriage license between John Cage and Xenia Andreyevna Kashevaroff June 7, 1935 in Yuma, Arizona.

Cage spent two more years in L.A. after leaving Schoenberg's class.

This is when he began to find his voice, and it would be hard to imagine that happening in quite the same way anyplace else.

One inspiration was the animator Oskar Fischinger .

A German émigré whose application of classical music to abstract imagery was one of the models for the Disney film "Fantasia," Fischinger practiced Buddhism and further paved the way for Cage's later fascination with Zen.

He also provided Cage with a model for eloquent graphic notation, which would become another Cagean hallmark.

Next, Cage accompanied dance at UCLA either on the piano or with percussion, and he assisted his Aunt Phoebe in her music education classes at UCLA's progressive elementary school on Sunset Boulevard.

For an aquatic ballet, Cage came up with the idea of a dipping a gong into the pool so the swimmers could hear it underwater.

The water gong was the first among a great many original sound-producing contraptions the son of an inventor would devise throughout his career.

He put together a list of 10 "Rules and Hints for Student and Teachers, or Anybody Else."

Rule 4 is "Consider everything an experiment."

Rule 9 advises "Be happy whenever you can manage it."

Rule 10 advocates breaking all the rules, "even our own rules."

It was at the UCLA elementary school where Cage first experimented with placing household objects on or in between the strings of the piano to create a new percussion effect.

Around the time of his 26th birthday, Cage took a job as a dance accompanist at the Cornish School in Seattle, where he claimed to have invented the prepared piano, in which he inserted nut and bolts, screws and rubber erasers inside the piano.

This radically changed the nature of the piano, turning it into a gently startling one-man percussion band, and it was one of the things for which he became known.

But the prepared piano's origins were decidedly on Sunset Boulevard.

After two years in Seattle, a year in the San Francisco Bay Area and a year in Chicago, Cage moved to New York.

He and Kashevaroff divorced after 10 years of marriage, and Cage spent the rest of his life with dancer and choreographer Merce Cunningham, whom he had met at Cornish.

Remembering John Cage at 100What would have been John Cage's 100th birthday on Wednesday is being celebrated around the globe throughout the year.

Cage's parents also came East and Cage's trips back to L.A. were infrequent and always to give performances.

But he also often acknowledged his debt to his hometown, and one way he did so was by accepting an honorary degree from the California Institute of the Arts in 1986.

He had been offered many others but turned all the others down.

I lived in New York during the last four years of Cage's life and spent as much time around him as I could.

He had felt I might make a good biographer for a biography he didn't really want written.

But he did seem almost obsessed with youth.

He particularly liked to speak about his father, whom he adored but hardly knew.

When Milton was busy on an invention, he might not emerge from his laboratory for days on end.

And Cage acknowledged that this led him to seek out father figures, such as Schoenberg and Duchamp.

Nor did he ever stop trying to prove himself to Schoenberg.

A system he called anarchic harmony, upon which he based his late music, was his answer to his old teacher.

During Cage's final summer, he even began rereading the Austrian master's "Harmonielehre."

Shortly before Cage suffered his fatal stroke, I happened to call his assistant, the Cage authority Laura Kuhn, who now heads the John Cage Trust at Bard College in New York.

"John," Kuhn relayed, "says it's going to rain like hell."

She then handed him the phone to say hello.

I joked that it would be a good, spooky night to read "Harmonielehre."

About a half-hour later, Cage collapsed on his kitchen floor and never regained consciousness.

Kuhn had left and Cage was making lemonade for Cunningham, who was on his way home.

Whatever his last thoughts were, Los Angeles hadn't been far away.

Timeline | Music | Inspiration | Critic's Notebook | Events

Graphic credits: Doug Stevens | Design and production by Lily Mihalik

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Xenia Cage (born Xenia Andreyevna Kashevaroff, August 15, 1913 – September 26, 1995) was an American painter, sculptor, bookbinder, conservator, and musician notable for her surrealist mobiles and artistic collaborations.
 Cage’s work has been described as on the “cutting edge of surrealism in sculpture” for her time.


Villeneuve, Frentzen, Salo and Fisichella completed the top ten ahead of qualifying.

(meta data) TITLE: Saturday Free Practice - Canadian GP

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Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period.

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The Wayback Machine - https://web.archive.org/web/20010428131240/http://www.atlasf1.com:80/news/2000/jun/report.php?id=2542

David Coulthard remained the fastest driver during free practice for the Canadian GP, but his McLaren teammate Mika Hakkinen was on a much quicker lap when he had to slow down because of yellow flags.

Coulthard sat out the first half of the session when McLaren decided to change his engine, which had developed an obscure electrical problem, but set several fast times when he resumed running in the second half.

Hakkinen, however, who was much happier with the balance of his MP4/15, was eight tenths under his time when he had to back off.

Despite the speed of the McLarens, Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello were happy with the performance of their Ferraris.

"We only made very small changes in set-up and we can improve a little bit more," Schumacher said.

"We each ran only one set of tyres, and experimented with trying worn tyres on the front, and then on the rear, to explore the handling characteristics of the cars in different trim.

This afternoon we need to guard against the rising temperature and changes in the wind direction."

Technical director Mike Gascoyne reported that there is little difference here between new or old tyres, so really it would be up to the drivers to choose what to run for qualifying.

Trulli is leaning towards new rubber, but Frenzten is not yet decided.

The Italian was very lucky to avoid an accident when he was nearly hit by Nick Heidfeld, who just managed to keep his Prost on the track after nearly spinning in the fast esses.

Big set-up changes improved Williams' downforce and mechanical grip.

Ralf Schumacher was very happy to have more grip and better traction, but felt his car's reaction was a little slow.

"My leg is absolutely no problem here," he reported.

Jenson Button was also happier, enjoying improved traction though still troubled by slight understeer in slow corners and the rear of the car bottoming.

"The change in weather made things more difficult for us," Villeneuve said, but he was happy with the balance of his BAR-Honda and believes he can qualify in the top 10.

Ricardo Zonta, meanwhile, continued to have gearbox problems, this time with the selection.

Mika Salo still had problems with traction and the driveability of his Sauber's engine.

?Qualifying will be very difficult, unless you have an absolutely clear lap, the Finn said.

?If you go even slightly off line, the tyres get really dirty.?

Pedro Diniz will use the spare car, after damaging his race car going over the kerb in the last corner.

Fisichella spun on oil dropped when Heidfeld's engine broke, but Wurz was a lot happier with the aerodynamic balance of his B200.

Herbert was happy with his Jaguar's set-up, but Irvine struggled with the low downforce set-up and had three spins.

2. M.Schumacher Ferrari 1:18.873 + 0.219

4. Hakkinen McLaren Mercedes 1:19.115 + 0.461

5. Trulli Jordan Mugen-Honda 1:19.342 + 0.688

6. R.Schumacher Williams BMW 1:19.536 + 0.882

7. Villeneuve BAR Honda 1:19.569 + 0.915

8. Frentzen Jordan Mugen-Honda 1:19.619 + 0.965

9. Salo Sauber Petronas 1:19.763 + 1.109

10. Fisichella Benetton Playlife 1:19.847 + 1.193

11. Button Williams BMW 1:19.918 + 1.264

12. Verstappen Arrows Supertec 1:19.988 + 1.334

13. Wurz Benetton Playlife 1:20.005 + 1.351

14. Herbert Jaguar Cosworth 1:20.008 + 1.354

15. Alesi Prost Peugeot 1:20.021 + 1.367

16. Irvine Jaguar Cosworth 1:20.052 + 1.398

18. Heidfeld Prost Peugeot 1:20.486 + 1.832

19. Diniz Sauber Petronas 1:20.546 + 1.892

20. de la Rosa Arrows Supertec 1:20.552 + 1.898

21. Gene Minardi Fondmetal 1:20.914 + 2.260

22. Mazzacane Minardi Fondmetal 1:21.133 + 2.479

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(04-28-2001): Schumacher Takes Dominant Pole - Spanish GP

(04-28-2001): Saturday Second Free Practice - Spanish GP

(04-28-2001): Saturday First Free Practice - Spanish GP

(04-28-2001): Malaysian Minister Defends the GP's Financial Loss

(04-27-2001): Burti Compared Well to Barrichello, Says Irvine

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The weather conditions became more breezy but remained hot in the Saturday morning practice sessions. Häkkinen was fastest in the third practice session with a time of 1:19.115. Barrichello was second quickest, recording a lap time 0.089 seconds slower than Häkkinen. Michael Schumacher was third fastest, two-tenths of a second in front of Trulli, Ralf Schumacher and Villeneuve. Frentzen, Fisichella, Verstappen and Herbert completed the top ten. Coulthard did not set a lap during the third session as his team changed his engine as it developed an electrical problem. In the final practice session, Coulthard had a trouble-free session and was fastest with a time of 1:18.654. Michael Schumacher and Barrichello maintained their pace from Friday and were second and third fastest. Häkkinen was fourth quickest and was unable to improve his time as he passed an area with waved yellow flags. Trulli was fifth fastest, in front of Ralf Schumacher who was running quicker after set-up changes.


The Digital HD was released on Amazon and iTunes on April 25, 2017 while the DVD/Blu-ray debuted on May 9, 2017 and took the number one spot in sales.

(meta data) TITLE: 'Fifty Shades Darker' Debuts at No. 1 on DVD, Blu-ray Disc Sales Chart – Variety

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Salih won the election with 219 votes to 22.

(meta data) TITLE: Iraq: Parliament elects Barham Salih as new president | News | Al Jazeera

(meta data) PUBLISHED DATETIME: Mon Aug 05 2019 15:27:34 GMT+0000

# Iraq: Parliament elects Barham Salih as new president

The Kurdish moderate politician has named veteran Shia politician Adel Abdul Mahdi as prime minister-designate.

Salih is a former deputy prime minister of the Iraqi federal government [Reuters]

Iraq's legislators have elected veteran Kurdish politician Barham Salih as the country's new president, the state television reports.

Salih is a former prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government and a former deputy prime minister of the Iraqi federal government.

Widely seen as a moderate, Salih was chosen on Tuesday after a dispute between the two main Kurdish parties delayed the vote, eventually forcing them to choose among 20 nominees.

Salih routed his main rival, Fuad Hussein, with 219 votes to 22.

Shia legislator Hamid al-Moussawi said the session was delayed because the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan were unable to agree on a single candidate.

The new president will have 15 days to task the nominee of the largest parliamentary bloc with forming a new government.

Under an unofficial agreement dating back to the 2003 US-led invasion, Iraq's presidency - a largely ceremonial role - is held by a Kurd, while the prime minister is Shia and the parliament speaker is Sunni.

Salih has named veteran Shia politician Adel Abdul Mahdi as prime minister-designate and tasked him with forming a new government, two legislators told the Reuters news agency.

According to Iraq's constitution, Abdul Mahdi now has 30 days to form a government and present it to parliament for approval.

Abdul Mahdi was named by Salih less than two hours after he was elected president.

Tuesday's poll follows a weekend parliamentary election in the Kurdish autonomous region, mired in economic crisis and still in shock from the fallout of the referendum which sparked a punishing response from Baghdad.

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He was appointed as Chief of Staff of Masoud Barzani, the President of the Kurdistan Regional Government. In September 2018, the Kurdistan Democratic Party nominated him to be President of Iraq. Under the Iraqi political tradition of "muḥāṣaṣah", the presidency was reserved for a Kurd. The KDP claimed the right as the largest Kurdish political party in the May general election to nominate their candidate. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan also nominated a candidate, Barham Salih, and the two parties were unable to agree a consensus. This meant that the decision went to a secret ballot of the newly elected MPs in the Council of Representatives—a first since the invasion of Iraq.


In January 2010 the Albavision network had 26 television stations (including La Red (Chile), ATV (Peru), SNT (Paraguay) and Canal 9 (Argentina) and 82 radio stations.

(meta data) TITLE: Video Age International | Articles

(meta data) AUTHOR: wwww.sweatboxdesign.com

#### Central American Television Touched By An Angel

For someone who shuns the limelight, doesn't give interviews, doesn't want his picture taken and protects his privacy with zeal, Remigio Angel Gonzalez y Gonzalez, is surprisingly, an open book.

The Mexican-born, Miami, Florida resident is president and owner of Albavision, a Miami-based group that controls 26 TV stations in 10 Latin American countries, 21 of which it owns while the rest are affiliated for programming.

Albavision also controls 82 radio stations (25 of which are owned and operated) and 40 movie theaters (Cine Alba) in Guatemala and Costa Rica.

To the international TV distribution industry, Albavision is merely seen as an entity worth an estimated $14 million per year for program acquisitions, but to the Central American TV sector, as well as in countries such as Argentina (Channel 9), Chile (La Red), Paraguay (SNT), Peru (ATV) and Ecuador (RTS), Gonzalez is a pivotal figure.

Even though R. Angel Gonzalez (as he's less officially known, though in general he's just called Angel Gonzalez) is rarely in the trade press, a simple Google search in any of the Latin American countries in which he operates is sufficient to get a wealth of information from the various local media, which call him either El fantasma or The Ghost (from America Economia), or simply "The Mexican," because of his nationality.

Gonzalez was one of the subjects in a University of Texas Press book titled Latin Politics, Global Media.

In the parts of the TV industry that deal with the Americas, he's a well-known figure with many anecdotes to his name.

The neglect from the international TV trade press is mainly due to the fact that Central America tends to be ignored by the media in general, but no mas.

For all his popularity and notoriety, Gonzalez remains a complex figure –– just like the region in which he spreads his wings.

Officially, Central America comprises seven countries, but one, Belize, is an English-speaking nation.

Usually, for television program sales, the Caribbean is associated with Central America, but of its 20 countries, only three are Spanish-speaking: The Dominican Republic, Cuba and Puerto Rico.

However, Puerto Rico is part of the U.S. network feed and, on the Spanish-language side, is attached to the nine major Latin American TV territories.

On the other hand, Cuba has not yet returned to be part of the international TV community.

Therefore, for the purpose of this article, the Spanish-speaking region is comprised of: Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama and the Dominican Republic.

This is an area with 51.4 million people and 11 large cities.

Of these, Guatemala has the largest population (14 million), Honduras the greatest extension (109 sq. km) and the Dominican Republic the biggest economy (GDP of U.S. $78 billion).

This seven-country region's total GDP is about $400 billion, with a per capita GDP of $7,700 and with more than 5.6 million TVHH of which 870,000 are cable subscribers.

At one point, in 1821, with the exclusion of the Dominican Republic and what is now Panama, the region was even organized as a country, albeit briefly.

It was known as the Federal Republic of Central America.

So as not to make a diplomatic faux pas, it's necessary to point out that the aforementioned countries (excluding the Dominican Republic) are locally referred to as Central America and Panama.

The program license fee in the region for a 60-minute series ranges from an average of $300 in Nicaragua to $700 in Panama (see chart on the next page).

Prices are not always reflective of TV ad market size or TVHH.

For example, Panama has the lowest population among the seven countries, and yet it's the largest TV market in terms of advertising revenues and program acquisition prices (see chart on the next page).

Costa Rica, with a smaller TV market, a much smaller population and a lesser GDP than Guatemala, pays an average of 32 percent more for programming.

Going back to the caudillo of Central American TV, technology could be warming Gonzalez up to some "controlled" press coverage.

For example, much emphasis was given to the fact that in May 2008, when he created Albavision (in honor of his wife Alba Elvira Lorenzana from Guatemala), he agreed to a website (www.albavision.tv) with links to his key TV stations.

The following month he agreed to be quoted in the press release from Harris (the digital TV transmitter manufacturer), stating: "We consider this a natural step in the evolution of free and open television.

Aside from offering excellent content, our responsibility with advertisers and audiences is also to guarantee the best quality and signal coverage, regardless of the receiving equipment.

That is our focus in high-definition digital television, and very soon, with signals in mobile equipment as well.

The new ATSC mobility capability allows us to meet both objectives in an efficient and cost-effective way."

Previously, he gave a telephone interview to Will Weissert of the Associated Press that was published on June 9, 2002.

In that report, it was revealed that Gonzalez's net worth was U.S.$350 million.

Today, his wealth has been estimated at U.S.$2 billion by various unsubstantiated news accounts (Forbes doesn't have him on its list of world billionaires).

However, considering his 21 TV stations and other multi-million dollar interests, that worth is feasible.

The greatest shock among people who know him came on October 23, 2008, when he organized a cocktail reception in Washington, D.C. to announce the launch of Albavision's pay-TV channel on his three-year old satellite TV service Telecentro, on the DirecTV TV Más platform.

That last service was launched in partnership with Guillermo Cañedo White, former CFO of Grupo Televisa.

Telecentro is a TV service programmed with fare from Gonzalez's Central American TV stations and directed at the estimated six million Central Americans who live in the United States.

Other Albavision expansion strategies (in addition to mobile TV) that will bring Gonzalez unavoidable visibility are his plan to co-produce 10 telenovelas in a five-year period with Peru's Chroma Producciones, and his intent to develop a Central American all-news TV channel.

Gonzalez, one of 13 children, was born in 1944 to a middle-class family in Sabinas Hidalgo, a small town near the industrial Mexican city of Monterrey.

He started his television career in 1971 selling telenovelas in Central America, which were produced in Mexico City by Genaro Delgado Parker when his station in Peru (Panamericana de Television) was nationalized.

In Mexico, Parker's telenovelas were broadcast on Channel 8.

When Channel 8 merged with Telesistema to form Televisa in 1973, Parker left Mexico and Gonzalez moved to Guatemala.

There he continued his barter business, basically selling advertising time for Channel 7 –– a station that he now owns –– within the telenovelas library that Parker had left him to distribute.

In Guatemala, Gonzalez met his first wife, the sister of Luis Rabbé, a future Guatemalan government minister (she later died in a car accident).

Rabbé eventually went on to marry one of Gonzalez's sisters.

A few years later, Gonzalez started Prolasa, a Guatemala-based company used to buy programs from U.S. companies and re-sell then to Central American TV stations.

He also used American content to program stations in exchange for their air time.

By 1974 he had developed a good relationship with U.S. studios including MCA (now NBC Universal).

In 1976, he was called back to Mexico by his friend Margarita Lopez Portillo, owner of RTC and sister of the country's then president José Lopez Portillo.

Margarita offered Gonzalez a job at Imevision (now TV Azteca), in effect making him a content provider for Channel 7 and Channel 13, which at that time were Mexican government-owned stations, and a few independent stations, of which there were many in Mexico.

His biggest coup came in 1978, when he purchased Franco Zeffirelli's miniseries Jesus of Nazareth from ITC's Armando Nuñez Sr., which he then sold to Channel 13.

In 1980, he went back to Guatemala and married Alba.

The following year, he acquired his first two TV stations in Guatemala: Channel 3 for U.S.$7 million and Channel 7 for U.S.$3 million (he now controls four stations in the country, having added Channel 11 and 13).

After Guatemala, he began investing in broadcasting operations in Nicaragua.

He now has his hands in three of Nicaragua's nine TV stations: He owns Channel 10, has majority ownership of Channel 4 and has Channel 12 as a program affiliate station.

Subsequently, Gonzalez made his moves in Costa Rica where he now owns three TV stations (one, Channel 4, was acquired from TV Azteca).

In the Dominican Republic, he has program affiliation with Channels 2 and 11.

Naturally, he has not neglected his native country, and in the South of Mexico, he owns five TV stations.

In 1986, he also became a Latin American wholesaler for New World under Jim McNamara.

The abundance of its library material allowed Gonzalez to continue selling programs to the under-performing stations in Central America that could not afford to buy better shows.

For some stations, in exchange for the programs, he received a promissory note or stock in the station and eventually accumulated enough shares in a few to take them over.

Around that same period, he decided to tackle the problem of pirated TV signals in Central America.

At the time, some TV stations and virtually all the cable or MATV operators in the region were banking on the notion that they were off the international TV industry's radar, and started to pick up and re-transmit U.S. networks' programs locally –– down-linking satellite feeds without paying the license fees

Gonzalez, who was selling programs from many U.S. companies, pressured Central American TV stations to abide by international laws and be part of the world television industry as accepted members.

At the same time, he was lobbying the U.S. TV networks (which in that era had their own program distribution divisions) to scramble their satellite signals in order to avoid piracy in Central America.

In 1987, Gonzalez moved to Miami and became a resident.

His modus operandi has adapted to the new technology, but not changed entirely.

His consistent strength is his ability to pay content owners on time in exchange for a reduction of license fees (that at times could reach up to 25 percent of the rate card).

This in addition to the fact that he often buys for multiple territories, thus extracting additional savings by taking advantage of the economy of scale.

Based in his offices in Miami and with the help of a small staff, Gonzalez oversees programming for TV stations in 10 countries spanning the whole of Latin America and including territories such as Argentina, Chile and Mexico.

His two daughters are active in Albavision, with Marcela Gonzalez taking a more managerial role.

Recently, he has curtailed his TV trade show presence and started to enjoy the simple things in life, like dining in his restaurants, Linda B Steakhouse in Key Biscayne, Miami and Key West, Florida and enjoying his houses in Miami, New Orleans, Mexico City and Guatemala City.

One thing he will not give up is his entourage of five trusted secretaries and his quest to learn the English language.

The foundation for the Albavisión network, created in May 2008, was laid in 1981 when González acquired his two Guatemalan television stations (Canal 3 and 7). At the time, González was a sales representative for Mexico's Televisa, selling its programming in Central America, and used Televisa's loan backing to acquire the station. In the mid-1990s he acquired Guatemala's Canal 13, and completed a "virtual monopoly control of that nation's commercial television airwaves".


On October 21, 2007, "Death Note" premiered on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim.

(meta data) TITLE: Death Note Confirmed to Air on Adult Swim October 20 - Anime News Network

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Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period.

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# Death Note Confirmed to Air on Adult Swim October 20

The Adult Swim network in the United States has confirmed on its online message boards that it will premiere the Death Note supernatural suspense anime series on October 20 at 12:00 a.m.

The network had previously posted a television schedule with that timeslot's program title blacked out, but also broadly hinted that it would be Death Note.

licensed the series from Viz Media, which also releases the original manga series.

The Viz Pictures live-action film affiliate will release the two live-action movies separately.

Anime News Nina! - 2007-01-22The grim reality of long-running shonen action series finally catches up with Nina in her quest to finish watching Ultimate Mop Daisuke DX.

- Complex and LovelyCarlo has been writing RTO!! for the past two years, and he's tired.

Now it's YOUR turn to write manga reviews!

Find out how inside, along with reviews of Love*Com, Gintama, Dragon Eye and the Import of the Month.

Shelf Life - Rumble PakTrips to the beach! Bowls of ramen!

Imaginasian Entertainment and Bandai Entertainment Announce "Anime Movie Classics" Week

ADV Films UK Halts Sale & Distribution of Select Titles: Specified Titles on Hiatus from 16th January 2008

ADV Films UK's Warehouse Blowout Sale for 1 Week Only

Viz Media to Showcase Variety of Unique Animated Properties from Japan at 2008 NATPE Conference

The Super Dimension Century Orguss DVD 3-6As

it digs into the meat of its run, the series' stand-alone stories are gelling into a continuous plot, its cast solidifying, and its tone darkening.

A welcome change, if not an unconditional improvement.

Kitchen Princess GN 4It's still a likable series if you enjoy your emotional ups and downs, but it looks like Najika's culinary aspirations have hit the back burner for a while.

Gyo GN 1Legged fish attack Okinawa in this admittedly silly horror story that saves itself from becoming a joke thanks to Junji Ito's freaky art and understanding of the horrors of mutable flesh.

Aria GN 1With a feel-good philosophy at its core, Aria's first volume is 180 pages of pure, serene happiness.

Le Chevalier D'Eon DVD 6Twists and stunning developments abound as this involved period piece wraps up its innumerable plot threads and comes to a proper conclusion.

ADV's signature series for 2007 ends as strong as it started, and perhaps even a little stronger.

5More new worlds, more crossover characters?

Syaoran and Sakura being adorably (pseudo) romantic?

Yawara! Preview DVDThis is feel-good entertainment without all of the treacly baggage, and things simply don't get much better than that.

DVDBoth of the Gunbuster OVA series have been trimmed and edited into a pair 95-minute movies in this special release.

If your budget can handle the price, it is a set worth owning.

Pumpkin Scissors GN 1This action series about a military unit dedicated to war relief gets off to a solid start by featuring strong lead characters, a good concept, and occasional small touches of humor.

The anime version is slightly better, however.

Glass Fleet DVD 2The second volume inserts a few more players into this tale of war between aristocrats and commoners in space, but otherwise maintains the exact same mix of mild entertainment, bad drama and predictable politics.

prefix dis- places the word "Disgaea" in the company of words like dismal and disappointing.

A three-hour "Director's Cut" compilation TV special, titled "Death Note: Relight: Visions of a God", aired on NTV a few months after the anime concluded. Although advertised to be the "complete conclusion", the popularity of the series inspired the release of a second TV special, titled "Death Note: Relight 2: L's Successors" nearly a year later. These specials recap the first and second arcs of the anime respectively, with new scenes added to fill in any plot holes resulted from omitted footage.
 In 2007, Viz Media licensed the series for a bilingual release in North America. Episodes of the series were officially available for download soon after they aired in Japan; according to Viz, this was "significant because it [marked] the first time a well known Japanese anime property [was] made legally available to domestic audiences for download to own while the title still [aired] on Japanese television." Viz Media began releasing these episodes via Direct2Drive on May 10, 2007. In addition to this downloadable release of a subtitled version of the series, Viz also acquired the rights for the home video release of both the subtitled and dubbed version of the series.


Bourbon Street was opened in 1971 by Doug Cole, also the owner of George's Spaghetti House.

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# Doug Cole, founder of Toronto's first jazz club, has died

By Patty WinsaStaff ReporterSun., June 17, 2012timer3 min. read

Doug Cole, the founder of Toronto's jazz scene in the '50s, has died just days before he was to receive the Queen's Diamond Jubilee medal in honour of his contributions.

"He just couldn't hang on," said his son, Ken Cole, from Huntsville, where he had just finished a round of golf on Sunday in honour of his dad.

The two had a tradition of playing the game on Father's Day.

"We hoped he would last until Monday or Tuesday and my brother and sister and I could bring (the medal) back and give it to him.

"We will bring it home and place it with his Order of Canada."

Doug Cole died June 15 in a Huntsville hospice.

Cole founded Toronto's first jazz club, George's Spaghetti House, at Dundas and Sherbourne Sts. in 1956 at a time when jazz wasn't that popular in the city.

"When we first started, the club was so empty Doug would have his own private concerts," remembers drummer Archie Alleyne, 80.

But "he loved his jazz and he loved his local musicians."

There wasn't even enough money at the beginning to change the name of the club from George's to Doug's, says veteran jazz musician Jim Galloway, who played there in the '70s and '80s.

"That's what the name was before (Doug) took it over and he couldn't afford a new sign," said Galloway.

The venue eventually took off, attracting some of the best jazz musicians in the country, including trumpet player Guido Basso, drummer Jerry Fuller, guitarist Ed Bickert and Don Thompson, who played numerous instruments.

Legendary producer and saxophonist Moe Koffman began booking acts for the club and stayed as the musical director for 25 years.

"All those players are considered world class and they honed their craft in Doug's clubs," said Ken.

His father, a former Toronto police officer, fell in love with the music after hearing a version of the jazz standard "Body and Soul."

Doug went on to open Castle George on the second floor of the jazz venue.

The club had a happy hour when locals came to dance.

It also attracted a number of Toronto Maple Leafs, including Eddie Shack and Bobbie Baun, who would come to share a meal or beer with Doug.

He was a wonderful man, a kind man," said Alleyne, an Order of Canada recipient who still performs once a month at The Pilot in Yorkville.

"I don't think I ever heard him say a nasty word or get angry."

Doug opened two more clubs, Bourbon Street and Basin Street, on the first and second floor of a building on Queen St. W.

International jazz superstars such as pianist Bill Evans, the Marsalis family and saxophonist Stan Getz all appeared.

"Doug was a complicated, charismatic man who was, in his day, a mover and a shaker," said Ken.

"He could really organize and put together venues and events.

The whole jazz movement in Toronto and Canada was formed around his clubs."

The crowds also began to fill with famous faces, including Sammy Davis Jr., Harry Belafonte, Isaac Hayes, Peter Gabriel, Rod Stewart and Howard Hughes.

"It took on a life of its own," said Ken, who watched his father's business unfold from the kitchen where he first worked as a dishwasher.

Jazz is not a popular music form, but it became very popular."

The Basin Street venue also took on award-winning plays such as Salome Bey's Indigo.

"A lot of his honours have been for fathering and fostering that Canadian aspect of it," said Ken.

Get more of today's top stories in your inboxSign up for the Star's Morning Headlines newsletter for a briefing of the day's big news.

His father sold the clubs in the mid-80s and spent winters in Costa Rica and summers in Port Sydney.

The family hopes to organize a celebration of Doug's life at the Rex Hotel Jazz and Blues Bar on Queen St. W. in the future.

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He is the creator and executive producer of the ABC TV series "Castle", which he also frequently writes.

(meta data) TITLE: An interview with Andrew W. Marlowe about Castle's recent steampunk episode | Tor.com

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## An interview with Andrew W. Marlowe about Castle's recent steampunk episode

Following the great success of Castle's recent steampunk episode, "Punked" (for anyone in need of background on "Punked", please see author G. D. Falksen's recent review), we asked G. D. Falksen to conduct an interview with Castle's creator and executive producer, Andrew W. Marlowe, and ask him a few questions about the show.

As you may or may not know (but as Mr. Marlowe will soon reveal), the idea for the Castle steampunk episode was born from a blog post written by G. D. Falksen last year.

It's funny how you never know who is reading what, or where it might go.

G. D. Falksen:Where did you first get the idea to do a steampunk episode of Castle?

Well, honestly, you know we like going into subcultures, we like pulling back the layers of all the places in New York you can go, but it was your article on NCIS that actually inspired us.

We pull articles and press on the show, and you were talking about "Vampire Weekend" and you mentioned your disappointment with the NCIS steampunk episode.

So I tucked that away in the back of my mind thinking that it would actually be a great kind of episode for Castle and Beckett because of the kind of person Castle is.

It felt like a subculture he would easily slide into and have some fun stuff to say about.

And then when one of my writers came to me with an idea of antique dueling pistols and secret societies in New York, I thought it was a real natural mix.

It's something that when you put it on screen, you have a great deal of production value; it looks fun, it looks interesting.

If you stepped out to do just a steampunk episode I think finding an access point for it might be challenging, but since it wedded so well with what my writer David Gray had come up with in terms of the duel, I just wanted to pursue it to see if we could do it really well.

GDF:You clearly did very thorough research on both the steampunk genre and the subculture for this episode.

How did you go about researching the topic?

AWM:Well, you know there's a lot of stuff online.

We also talked to a couple of people in the field and we had really good conversations.

Our wardrobe department met with some of the people in the field out here in Los Angeles.

And for us, where so many other shows take a look at these cultures from a derisive point of view because they're outside the mainstream, we want to do exactly the opposite.

We want to bring them to the forefront and celebrate the differences.

So for us, having that level of authenticity was just honoring what you guys are doing out there in the community.

As a science fiction fan, I think I was a steampunk guy long before the term existed, having been a huge fan of Jules Verne and H. G. Wells and even early cinema, the stuff that Méliès was doing, where you mix those Victorian elements with the futuristic elements.

For me it was a way to delve into that as well.

There are certain steampunk-themed evenings down here, like at the Edison downtown.

So we explored some of those as well and talked to some of the people who were into it.

GDF:Was the concept for the plot developed alongside the steampunk aesthetic of the episode, or was it developed separately?

AWM:The kernel of the idea was separate, but once we had the idea of these antique bullets and the duels, we brought steampunk into it and then developed it as one story.

What I was presented with was a concept that was missing story execution, but it was a really delicious concept of pulling a bullet out of somebody and the bullet's from the 1800s.

But how do you service that credibly was the next step, and bringing in the steampunk aspect felt like it was a real value add for us.

GDF:The steampunk club presented in the episode was a wonderful realization of the concept.

Is it an actual club, or was it more or less a set or location dressed for the part?

AWM:It was a location that was dressed that way for the part.

As far as we know there is not a secret steampunk society in New York.

We do know that the clubs in New York have steampunk-themed evenings, but we also know that New York is rife with secret societies.

You know these brownstones in the Upper East Side where you might have a literary society; some places that are very Skull and Bones.

So we took a little license with taking those ideas and putting them together.

GDF:How did the cast, crew, and production team of Castle take to doing a steampunk-themed episode?

In particular, Nathan Fillion is quite popular among steampunk fans; what did he think of the episode?

AWM:For the production team, whenever we go into a world they take it as a real challenge, and our conversations are always "how do we do it well?" and "how do we do it authentically?"

"How do we get the most bang for the buck visually?"

"Who in the community can we go to, to become partners in this with us?"

So they really took it as a challenge and they wanted to put their best foot forward, and I think they just did a terrific job.

And Nathan knows what his fan base is, and he knows how many people who are big fans of his are interested in this and are participants.

And as somebody who has a huge presence at Comic Con—and he's a guy who walks the floor at Comic Con—I think that he was really thrilled and excited to have this opportunity.

GDF:Having tackled steampunk, what can viewers of Castle expect to see as the current season progresses?

Well, as much fun as it is to go into the worlds, they also have a price tag attached to them.

So we can't go into them as often as we may like, and I think that's probably a good thing because every season needs balance.

But we have a really fun one coming up, which honors some of our X-Filesroots on the show.

My executive producer/director/partner Rob Bowman directed many of the X-Filesepisodes and our director of photography Bill Roe was the cinematographer on the X-Files.

And in this episode, despite Beckett and Castle's attempt to keep their focus on an earthly suspect, everything keeps pointing back to alien abduction.

We start with a body, a body that presents having been killed with explosive decompression, which is something that can occur in space.

But the episode is actually surprisingly grounded at the end of the day.

Just like with the steampunk episode, there is the danger of becoming too fanciful for the story you're telling, and you always have to bring it back to reality at some point.

So with this we're very cognizant of when we step into one of these territories that we have to do it justice by doing it well and also figure out the real life motives and the real life underpinnings.

But it's great, we have Lyle Lovett in the episode and he's playing a government agent, i.e. a man in black.

And Lance Henriksen is in it as a UFO abduction specialist.

GDF:Do you have any closing remarks or a message to the public that you'd like to leave?

We're just very excited at all the people in the community who helped make the episode great, who came out and supported us that day, who participated, and we're happy to be getting the great feedback that we've been getting on the show.

It was just as exciting an experience for us to be able to mount it as it was for people to see it.

We are all extremely pleased at the opportunity to share some insight into the creative minds that brought you the first real coverage of steampunk on a mainstream TV show.

Our congratulations to Mr. Marlowe and to all the people working on Castlefor their hard work and a job well done.

Evelyn Kriete is extremely grateful to G. D. Falksen and Andrew W. Marlowe for taking the time to do this interview.

If you want to follow more of what Evelyn is up to, keep an eye on her Facebook and her Twitter, as her website is in the middle of an overhaul.

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He won the Nicholl Fellowship award for screenwriting for his script "The Lehigh Pirates." "Apogee", a space-based adventure he wrote soon after, sold for $500,000. He went on to write "Air Force One", "End of Days" and "Hollow Man".
 He wrote the unproduced scripts "Hammer Down", "Alien Prison" and a Western intended for Harrison Ford and John Woo.


Under Kelly, TWCC saw huge growth in its digital media business, specifically involving its mobile apps and data.

(meta data) TITLE: David Kenny Replacing Mike Kelly As CEO Of The Weather Channel Companies – Gigaom

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# David Kenny Replacing Mike Kelly As CEO Of The Weather Channel Companies

In a surprise move, The Weather Channel Companies is swapping out CEOs.

David Kenny is replacing Mike Kelly as CEO effective immediately; the Akamai-Digitas vet also will be chairman of the company owned by a consortium of Bain Capital, The Blackstone Group, and NBC (NSDQ: CMCSA) Universal.

It appears so far that this is less about any issues with Kelly's performance and more about getting Kenny.

Kelly will become an advisor to TWCC and to Bain, and Kenny begins in his new role effectively immediately.

Kelly had been CEO of TWCC since July 2009 and other past roles have included head of media at AOL (NYSE: AOL).

Kenny, meanwhile, brings with him some skills that could help TWCC's growth in the years ahead.

He comes from streaming and content delivery giant Akamai (NSDQ: AKAM), where he had been president.

Prior to that, Kenny racked up of years of experience in digital marketing and interactive advertising: he co-founded VivaKi, the digital and television arm of Publicis Groupe, and he was chairman and CEO Digitas Inc.

In an interview with paidContent a few moments ago, Kenny said that the offer of a CEO job had come out of initial conversations for him to join the board of The Weather Channel.

"We'd been talking about how to move faster on programming and other areas," and that gradually progressed to the subject of Kenny taking on a bigger role.

He told paidContent that the three key areas he hopes to focus on as CEO are to invest more in programming, digital assets and international expansion.

In programming, the emphasis will be on making more long-form content, while the mobile apps and the website will focus on more basic weather information.

Both of these are largely ad-supported at the moment, and Kenny said this is how they will remain.

As for international, this is where you can see the Akamai content delivery expertise coming into view: "TWCC has been more focused on the U.S. up to now, but there is an opportunity globally and I believe you will see a much more global enterprise going forward," he said.

In a departing internal memo to staff, which paidContent has obtained and is copying below, Kelly gave Kenny a full endorsement in the role: "TWCC will be in good hands with David Kenny at the helm," he wrote.

He noted also that the pair have been good friends for many years.

Under Kelly, TWCC has seen some huge growth in its digital media business — specifically around its many apps for mobile devices.

Being about weather — a subject that is continually changing — these apps have picked up a particularly loyal following.

At paidContent's mobile conference last year, Kelly noted that mobile users use The Weather Channel's apps 26 days a month, with 30 million of the company's apps getting downloaded in 2010.

Overall reach for the company, as reported last year, was 35 million people, covering access from TVs, PCs, and mobile devices.

During one period last year the company launched 10 separate apps in 11 weeks.

As you know, this morning we announced a change in leadership for TWCC.

As we make this transition, let me take a moment to thank you for making the last two and a half years such a pleasant and rewarding experience.

I came to The Weather Channel with many goals, including building a strong team, developing long term plans and moving the business forward.

A part of these efforts included our "one company" initiatives, which I believe have been a tremendous success.

I'm proud of these accomplishments and even more proud of the teamwork it took to get it all done.

I will continue to be involved in the company, serving as a special adviser to David and the Board of Directors and I will also serve as an adviser to Bain Capital.

TWCC will be in good hands with David Kenny at the helm.

We've been friends for many years and I am certain he is the leader who will keep things moving forward and secure a great future for the company.

Thank you again for your hard work and dedication.

We've come a long way together and we've seen the power of one company and the power of vision and values.

In the past years, we've seen record viewership and page views and saw our mobile business reach unimaginable heights.

The resulting economic growth has put us in a strong position.

## 5 questions for… Auddly, targeting the source of music creation

## Will 2017 be the Armageddon for Online Ads?

## Business on Display: Making a Statement with Digital Signage

On July 20, 2009, shortly after The Weather Channel was sold by Landmark Communications to NBC Universal and private equity firms Bain Capital and Blackstone Group for $3.5 billion, Kelly was named president and CEO of The Weather Channel Companies (TWCC). He was responsible for the strategic direction and operations of The Weather Channel, The Weather Channel Interactive, weather.com and The Weather Channel Mobile, Weather Services International and Enterprise Electronics Corporation.


The Armed Forces of the UAE has reported that four Emirati soldiers died as of 13 June.

(meta data) TITLE: Four 4 UAE soldiers killed in Battle of Hodeidah in Yemen – UAE Armed Forces | Arab News

Tel Aviv beaches fall foul in Israel's passion for plastic Somalia's Jubbaland president wins new term amid rift with central government

Hamdok, UN economist turned Sudanese premier Saudi prosecutor issues arrest warrant over video showing child making knife threats Egypt raises Sinai investment by 75% in 2019-20

Palestinians say receive Israeli part-payment of overdue taxes Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova to clash in US Open first round blockbuster India-Pakistan Davis Cup tie postponed over security fears Video of woman beaten at Iranian airport sparks anger in Iraq

# Four 4 UAE soldiers killed in Battle of Hodeidah in Yemen – UAE Armed Forces

File photo showing UAE soldiers in Aden southern Yemen.

#### Hide comments Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus.

##### Britain requests UN Security Council meeting on Yemen port offensive

##### Press freedom group CPJ urges UN to probe Yemeni journalist's death

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##### Two Israeli Arabs charged over alleged Daesh support

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Battle timeline.:First phase.:June: Initial advances.

The aim was to cut off Houthis supplies and force them to come to the negotiation table. Coalition forces have established a forward operating base at the nearby town of al-Khoka, south of Al Hudaydah.
 According to Yemeni officials, approximately 2,000 Emirati troops assaulted Al Hudaydah, departing from a UAE naval base in Eritrea. A worker for CARE reported hearing at least 30 airstrikes on the first day of fighting as the city population was caught in a panic. On the first day of the battle, Emirati and coalition forces reportedly moved to capture Hodeida International Airport, approaching within a few miles.
 On the first day of fighting, 250 Houthi combatants were also reported killed.
 Almasirah and Houthi spokesman Loai al-Shami claimed that Houthi forces hit a coalition ship with two missiles, though this remains unconfirmed.