Read more music news at Tulsa World reporter Jennifer Chancellor's blog.
Carrie Underwood announced the official release date for her upcoming album on Thursday. Her album, still unnamed, will be released May 1 in the United States.
She also will perform with Aerosmith's Steven Tyler on Country Music Television's "CMT Crossroads" show 10 p.m. Saturday and 1 a.m. Sunday.
The anticipated album was produced by Mark Bright (Rascal Flatts, Reba McEntire, Sting, Brad Paisley, Vince Gill), and Entertainment Weekly has already called the album one of the "10 albums we can't wait for."
It's the fourth studio album for the Checotah-born country singer.
The album's first single, "Good Girl," will be released Feb. 23 to country radio.
She's had 14 No. 1 singles and sold more than 14 million albums since her "American Idol" win and her solo debut in 2005.
Originally published by JENNIFER CHANCELLOR World Scene Writer.
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Pioneer had soul to spare ; The host of "Soul Train" helped launch a TV outlet for black culture.
Feb 04, 10:58 AM
By FRAZIER MOORE
NEW YORK - In an era when Beyonce and Jay-Z are music royalty, when Barack Obama is the nation's chief executive, and when black stars in the cast of a TV show are commonplace, it may be hard to grasp the magnitude of what Don Cornelius created once he got his "Soul Train" rolling.
Yes, the syndicated series delivered the music of Earth Wind & Fire, the Jacksons, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder into America's households, infusing them with soul in weekly doses. Yes, it gave viewers groovy dances and Afro-envy, helping get them hip to a funky world that many had never experienced, or maybe even suspected.
But it was more than that. Before BET would give African- Americans their own channel, and before black music and faces found their way to MTV videos as well as network dramas and comedies, "Soul Train" became a pioneering outlet for a culture whose access to television was strictly limited.
"Most of what we get credit for is people saying, 'I learned how to dance from watching "Soul Train" back in the day,' " Cornelius told Vibe magazine in 2006. "But what I take credit for is that there were no black television commercials to speak of before 'Soul Train.' There were few black faces in those ads before 'Soul Train.'
"And what I am most proud of," he added, "is that we made television history."
Cornelius, who became an icon defining black culture in America for decades, died at his California home Wednesday of a self- inflicted gunshot wound. He was 75.
"Soul Train" (which went on for 35 seasons) didn't make history just by influencing the music charts. It served as a pop-culture preview and barometer of fashion, hairstyles and urban patois.
By some measure, "Soul Train" was the equivalent of Dick Clark's "American Bandstand," although belatedly. Arriving on the wave of the civil rights era, it premiered 13 years after "Bandstand" went national, then took awhile longer to attract local stations to air it and advertisers to support it.
From there, it became a Saturday afternoon ritual as soul and rap artists (and white artists, too, including Elton John and David Bowie) showed off their latest releases while kids responded on the dance floor.
"When you come up with a good idea, you don't have to do a whole lot," Cornelius told The New York Times in 1996 in describing his show's formula. "The idea does it for you."
On "Soul Train" ("the hippest trip in America," the announcer proclaimed, "across the tracks of your mind") the host, of course, was Cornelius, but to describe him as the black Dick Clark is somewhat misleading. (A bit like calling Pat Boone the white Little Richard, as David Bianculli noted in his "Dictionary of Teleliteracy.")
For Cornelius, the difference was in the execution, as he told The Associated Press in 1995.
"If I saw 'American Bandstand' and I saw dancing and I knew black kids can dance better; and I saw white artists and I knew black artists make better music; and if I saw a white host and I knew a black host could project a hipper line of speech - and I DID know all these things," then it was reasonable to try, he said.
On his show, Cornelius was the epitome of cool, with a baritone rumble that recalled seductive soul maestro Barry White, and an unflappable manner all the way through the hour to his trademark sign-off: "We wish you love, peace, and SOUL."
He laced his show with pro-social messages directed at his black audience.
On a 1974 program, he interviewed James Brown about the tragedy of violence in black communities ("black-on-black crime looks very bad in the sight of The Man," Brown said sorrowfully). Then he brought on a 19-year-old Al Sharpton, already a civil rights activist, who presented Brown with an award for his music.
But Cornelius never let preaching get in the way of "Soul Train's" hipness - or of his own.
Singer Mary Wilson of the Supremes said how much she wanted to dance with Cornelius on "Soul Train."
"You can dance with me," Cornelius replied. "But not on television." Later in the show he relented and they did dance.
Originally published by FRAZIER MOORE Associated Press.
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Connecticut on the dividing line between Giants, Pats fans
Feb 04, 04:40 AM
By John Burgeson, Connecticut Post, Bridgeport
Feb. 04--Brother against brother. Wife against husband. Father against son.
Sunday's Super Bowl matchup between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots is dividing family and friends across Connecticut, a Mason-Dixon Line of sorts for football fans in the Northeast.
There's an ill-defined diagonal boundary that runs between Torrington and New Haven, with Patriots fans to the northeast and Giants fans to the southwest. But sometimes those dividing lines are right in a family's living room.
"My family is all Giants fans, and my wife, Katie, well, her family is from Massachusetts, so she's a Patriots fan," said Eric Graf, of Stratford. "We got engaged at about the time the Giants and Patriots last met at the Super Bowl, so this has always been a big rivalry for us."
The Grafs have a 7-month-old daughter, Adalyn, who "alternates between her Patriots cheerleader outfit and a Giants outfit," according to Graf.
"But this week, I told my wife that she's a daddy's girl, and I think she looks better in the Giants outfit, in my opinion," he said. "But I'm obviously biased."
Even the family dogs get drawn into the battle sometimes.
"I'm the Giants fan," said Kristina Gerics, of Trumbull, whose fiance, Scott Grimo, is from Rhode Island, deep in Patriots territory. The couple has a pair of English pointers who have been wearing little Patriots and Giants doggie outfits in anticipation of Sunday's game.
"We're going to a friend's house in Stamford, and he'll be the only Patriots fan there," she said with a chuckle. They plan to wed in 2014, regardless of the game's outcome, she said.
Maura Satkowski, of Oxford, is in the opposite situation, having married into a family that has its share of Patriots fans.
"My brother-in-law, the flip-flopper, Matthew Satkowski, has three boys, 17, 13 and 11, who are all Patriots fans. Huge, huge," she said. "And my other brother-in-law is from Seymour and he's a big Patriots fan, too."
She said that she will be wearing her late father-in-law's Giants jersey. "He'd be thrilled to pieces to be here," she said, adding that her two kids, 10 and 13, "were brainwashed to be Giants fans."
Rich Widomski, of Shelton, has twin 14-year-old boys, who he says are alike in just about every aspect, except one.
"One is a huge Giants fan and the other is a big Patriots fan," he said.
The two boys, he said, might even wind up at different friends' homes to watch the game.
"One will be a happy camper after the game, the other, not so happy," he said.
In Weston, there's one man who Giants followers can forgive for switching his allegiances to the Patriots.
"First off, I'm a Brady," said William Brady, refering to Tom Brady, the Patriots' quarterback.
William Brady is retired now, but his career at IBM sent him to New Hampshire for years, a Patriots stronghold that's about as rock-solid as Beantown itself.
"When we grew up on Long Island, we were Giants fans, of course," he said. "But in New Hampshire, I started following them, and some people said that I was a even a distant relative to the quarterback," Brady said, a trace of the Boston accent still in his voice. "I never followed up on that."
At the Super Bowl party he is throwing at his home, he says he'll be a bit lonely.
"I'll be the only Patriots fan here," he said with a mixture of regret and resolve. "My grandchild asked me years ago if they could be Giants fans," he said. "Of course I told them that they could follow whomever they want."
Former Fairfield state representative and lawyer Christine Niedermeier, it can be said, bleeds Giant blue. As a child, she was at Giants games "when they were truly horrible" and playing at Yankee Stadium and the Yale Bowl. There are still four season tickets in the family's name, and she's missed nary a game.
"I even went to that horrible Super Bowl in Tampa when we got creamed by the Ravens," she said.
"The funny thing is, while I was a state rep, I met another woman, about 10 years younger than me, who was also a Christine Niedermeier," she said. "Same exact spelling. And she's a huge Patriots fan."
Niedermeier said that she had hoped to meet up with her namesake in Indianapolis, but she now lives in Los Angeles and her trip to Indiana never materialized.
The other Niedermeier -- her name now is Christine N. Lane -- said that she was a Giants fan growing up, but switched sides after she got married; he husband, Tom, is from Boston. Her sons, 11 and 14, are Patriots fans, too. She said that since the Rams moved out of Los Angeles in 1994, the natives there root for a variety of farflung teams.
"We're huge Red Sox fans, too -- all the Boston teams," Lane said.
Win or lose, the football fans contacted by the Post all said that they were looking forward to a tight game.
"Whoever wins, it's no big deal," said Satkowski. "We really enjoy watching football, I can't get enough of it, and this is sure to be a great game either way," she said. "It's big holiday for us -- we'll have about 25 people over the house."
Reach John Burgeson at 203-330-6403 or at jburgeson@ctpost.com. Follow twitter.com/johnburgeson
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Nominate a senior volunteer
Feb 04, 03:34 AM
By St. Cloud Times, Minn.
Feb. 04--Know of a senior who deserves recognition for volunteer work and contributions to the community?
The Home Instead Senior Care office serving seniors in the Northern Suburbs of Minneapolis and St. Paul has announced the Salute to Senior Service program to honor senior volunteers.
Nominees must be 65 or older and volunteer at least 15 hours a month.
Nominations will be accepted at www.SalutetoSeniorService.com through March 15. Nomination forms also can be requested at ckoehler@homeinsteadinc.com.
State Senior Hero winners will receive plaques, and their stories will be posted on the SalutetoSeniorService.com website. In addition, $5,000 will be donated to the national winner's nonprofit charity of choice.
Goodell: NFL adds Thursday games
INDIANAPOLIS -- The NFL is increasing the number of Thursday night games so more of its teams can play in prime time.
Commissioner Roger Goodell said there will be Thursday night games on the NFL Network from the second to the 15th week of the season, giving all teams a chance to appear in prime time on some outlet.
Those games will be in addition to Sunday night and Monday night games.
Goodell revealed the television scheduling change at his state of the NFL news conference Friday.
Oak Room closes in NYC
NEW YORK -- New York City's famous Algonquin Hotel has permanently shuttered the Oak Room, its fabled supper club that helped launch careers of many jazz and cabaret stars.
Hotel General Manager Gary Budge says audiences are declining, and the Oak Room will be turned into a lounge for hotel guests.
The Oak Room, a New York landmark as the site of the legendary Algonquin Round Table, became a nightclub in 1939. Stars such as Harry Connick Jr., Diana Krall and Michael Feinstein got their start there.
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Cancer recovery for Gibb
Feb 04, 01:27 AM
BEE Gees star Robin Gibb (left) has spoken about his "spectacular" cancer recovery saying: "I feel fantastic." The star has looked increasingly gaunt in recent months due to the illness and a bowel condition. There had also been reports he was close to death but he said he feels better than he has for a decade.
(c) 2012 Belfast Telegraph. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.