Monday, September 27, 2010
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Monday, September 13, 2010
Football Games Have 11 Minutes of Action
By DAVID BIDERMAN
Football fans everywhere are preparing to settle in for the NFL's biggest and most electric weekend of the season—a four-game playoff marathon that will swallow up at least 12 hours of broadcast time over two days.
But here's something even dedicated students of the game may not fully appreciate: There's very little actual football in a football game.
Photo illustration: Jeff Mangiat, photos, Getty Images (2), Associated Press (cheerleader), NFL (replay)
According to a Wall Street Journal study of four recent broadcasts, and similar estimates by researchers, the average amount of time the ball is in play on the field during an NFL game is about 11 minutes.
In other words, if you tally up everything that happens between the time the ball is snapped and the play is whistled dead by the officials, there's barely enough time to prepare a hard-boiled egg. In fact, the average telecast devotes 56% more time to showing replays.
So what do the networks do with the other 174 minutes in a typical broadcast? Not surprisingly, commercials take up about an hour. As many as 75 minutes, or about 60% of the total air time, excluding commercials, is spent on shots of players huddling, standing at the line of scrimmage or just generally milling about between snaps. In the four broadcasts The Journal studied, injured players got six more seconds of camera time than celebrating players. While the network announcers showed up on screen for just 30 seconds, shots of the head coaches and referees took up about 7% of the average show.
If you think the networks are a little too fond of cheerleaders, you may be mistaken: In these broadcasts, only two networks showed cheerleaders at all. And when they did, they were only on camera for an average of three seconds. "We make it a point to get Dallas cheerleaders on, but otherwise, it's not really important," says Fred Gaudelli, NBC's Sunday Night Football producer. "If we're doing the Jets, I couldn't care less."
Football—at least the American version—is the rare sport where it's common for the clock to run for long periods of time while nothing is happening. After a routine play is whistled dead, the clock will continue to run, even as the players are peeling themselves off the turf and limping back to their huddles. The team on offense has a maximum of 40 seconds after one play ends to snap the ball again. A regulation NFL game consists of four quarters of 15 minutes each, but because the typical play only lasts about four seconds, the ratio of inaction to action is approximately 10 to 1. (At the end of a game, if one team has a lead and wants to prevent the other team from scoring again, standing around and letting the clock run down becomes a bona fide strategy).
For broadcasters, filling these idle moments is always a unique challenge. Ken Crippen, the executive director of the Professional Football Researchers Association, who has a collection of broadcasts that date back to the 1930s, says most early telecasts showed a constant feed of the field with a few shots of the scoreboard for variety. "It was basically just constant, live action," he says.
Things began to change in the mid-1960s, when instant replay became commonplace. By the 1970s, broadcast crews had expanded to an average of eight cameras and three production trucks, a number that has only continued to grow. Mr. Gaudelli says that by the 1990s, some football broadcasts showed about 100 replays per game.
In the past decade, regular-season football telecasts have evolved into major productions that can cost between $150,000 and $250,000. Networks say they have anywhere from 80 to 200 people on hand per game with dozens of cameras. (NBC says its broadcasts require seven production trucks.) Producers say all this technology has made it easier to show shots of wacky fans, demonstrative coaches on the sidelines and video segments prepared before the game.
The result is that broadcasters have so many options that they have to spend a lot more time planning what to show—and what not to. Lance Barrow, CBS's lead football-game producer, says his crew meets for several hours with players and coaches from the home and road teams in the two days before kickoff just to prepare material to present during dead time. In August, Bill Brown, a senior football producer for Fox, says he met with about 100 colleagues at a conference center in New York to prepare the network's game plan for the season.
News Hub: NFL Games Lack Real Action
5:27How much football is actually shown (and played) during the average football telecast? The answer, based on a frame-by-frame analysis of four games is an average of 10 minutes and 43 seconds. WSJ's David Biderman reports.
According to Mr. Brown, there are often so many graphics and fillers at his crew's disposal that they've had to take pains to make sure they don't commit what he describes as the "mortal sin" of football broadcasting: missing a snap. "That's absolutely a jarring thought," Mr. Brown says.
For this study, The Journal broke down every frame of the broadcasts for four games on four networks on one weekend in late December. These included games between the Buffalo Bills and Atlanta Falcons on CBS, the Green Bay Packers and Seattle Seahawks on Fox, the Dallas Cowboys and Washington Redskins on NBC and the Chicago Bears and Minnesota Vikings on ESPN. Each shot in every broadcast was timed and logged in one of 22 categories.
In this sample of games, the networks showed some significant differences. ESPN showed 24 minutes worth of replays in its game, which was 41% more than the average of the other three networks. Jay Rothman, ESPN's senior coordinating producer for Monday Night Football, attributes this to the presence of Minnesota's star quarterback, Brett Favre. Mr. Favre, he says, is a "move-the-meter guy," who warrants a lot of extra attention.
In its game, NBC devoted more than twice as much time to nongame video packages as its competitors (decades-old pictures of John Madden with his wife, anyone?). CBS devoted 40 seconds to showing Atlanta's kicker, Matt Bryant, warming up to make a kick, which was more time than the other three networks devoted to kickers combined. (The kick was blocked).
In its game, Fox showed about 37% fewer replays than the other networks. Fox also showed about 16% more shots than the other networks of players on the sidelines.
When it comes to showing the cheerleaders, CBS won the day with about seven seconds. NBC had just over four seconds, and Fox and ESPN had no cheerleaders whatsoever. "Cheerleaders are bigger in college," says Mr. Brown of Fox, who notes that NFL cheerleaders from the visiting teams don't travel to road games and aren't as ingrained in the game as they are in college. "It's not that we don't like them," adds ESPN's Mr. Rothman. "They're just not our motivation."
The real test for any football-broadcast crew is what they do in a blowout. In cases like these, producers say they have no choice but to stray from on-field action. In the second quarter of the CBS game, for instance, the Bills and Falcons only managed to score three points. In that time, there were 88 shots of off-field elements, including 31 shots (186 seconds) where the cameras were trained on the two teams' coaches. That was 54% more than the average amount in any other quarter in that game.
When the Cowboys-Redskins game flagged in the second half, NBC turned to the activities of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones and Redskins owner Daniel Snyder—both of whom were sitting in their luxury boxes. Together, they got about eight seconds of air time in the first and second quarters when the game was close and more than 55 seconds in the third and fourth when the Cowboys had things firmly in hand.
The most surprising finding of The Journal's study—that the average game has just 10 minutes and 43 seconds of actual playing time—has been corroborated by other researchers. In November 1912, Indiana University's C.P. Hutchins, the school's director of physical training, observed a game, stopwatch in hand, between two independent teams. He counted 13 minutes, 16 seconds of play. During last week's Wild Card games, Mr. Crippen, the football researcher, dissected the broadcasts and found about 13 minutes, 30 seconds of action.
But while the game itself hasn't changed much, there's no question the broadcasts have evolved quickly.
Mr. Gaudelli of NBC, who has broadcast football games since 1990, says the good old days weren't always so good. "I tell our production assistants who are in their 20s that they should have to learn how to edit like we did when men were men," he says.
Write to David Biderman at David.Biderman@wsj.com
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By the numbers ...
What We Learned: NFL season reminds us why hockey's way better - Puck Daddy - NHL - Yahoo! Sports
Hello, this is a feature that will run through the entire season and aims to recap the weekend's events and boils those events down to one admittedly superficial fact or stupid opinion about each team. Feel free to complain about it.
Well, yesterday marked the full start of the NFL taking over the next 22 Sundays for countless men, women and children across America. And it served as a perfect reminder of just how stupid, boring and interminable the sport this nation has grown to love really is.
Being in Boston as I am, I was "treated" to the Patriots beating the absolute hell out of the Cincinnati defense for three hours, and this was an actual sequence of events: the Patriots kicked an extra point after a touchdown, so the network took a commercial break. Then they kicked off, Cincy kneeled it for a touchback, and there was another commercial. Then the Bengals ran three hilariously unsuccessful plays, and someone got hurt, so they took another break. Then the Bengals punted, so more commercials were played.
Watching this, I wasn't sure exactly what type of person would be enraptured by this revolting display of commercialism run rampant ... unless of course they are particularly big fans of Denis Leary witlessly extolling the virtues of fuel-inefficient trucks several times per quarter-hour.
Sports fans in the U.S. often knock hockey as being boring, and why wouldn't they? In football, there's all the fun and excitement of running for three yards, standing around for 40 seconds, watching a pass fall incomplete, then standing around again. Now that's entertainment. You don't get any of that exciting stuff in hockey, where it's all skate-skate-skate, shoot, hit, grind, skate-skate, save, block, icing. Then you don't get to take a break for longer than 15 seconds or so. What a snoozefest.
There are 60 minutes on the clock in both hockey and football. But the difference is that in football, the 60 minutes takes three times that length to play, and during that time, you see 11 minutes of athletes actually competing.
Luckily, all that downtime gives football players ample time to dance around like morons after a perfectly conventional play. This allows fans to gripe about "prima donnas" not "actin' like they've been there before." And where would American sports be without that kind of thing?
We don't have that kind of wanton show-boatery in hockey for two reasons.
(Coming Up: First stretcher-hit of the season; Rick DiPietro(notes) is, gulp, healthy; the fighting AfroGator; Colorado still not at the cap floor; Marc Savard's(notes) mind-frame; Selanne's tires of retire talk; Ponikarovsky speaks; the unstoppable Magnus Paajarvi-Svensson(notes); Dallas's dire chances; and a trade that sufficiently shuffles the deck chairs.)
First, the speed of the game doesn't allow someone time to hug every individual teammate after a slightly better than average hit.
And second, if someone did that against, say, the Flyers, Chris Pronger(notes) would skate over and calmly beat him to death.
Some have argued to me that they look football for the strategy of it all, and they love seeing a defensive playcall that puts four linebackers within three inches of the quarterback's face the second the ball is snapped. I get that, but I'd also be willing to bet the average football fan can't read the difference between a nickel and a 4-3. So what gives?
It's not as if strategy doesn't go into hockey. These guys aren't out there skating around with no system telling them where to be and what to do at all times unless they're coached by Wayne Gretzky.
And hockey rewards plays that are executed exactly as designed. Maybe two or three times a night, you'll watch a play and think, "That's exactly how the coach drew it up on the whiteboard."
Typically these plays result in a goal, and in hockey that typically makes a much greater difference than it would in football. What's the most common result of a perfect run on offense? Eight or nine yards on a carry up the middle? Whatever happens after that is down to the players in the secondary, who sure weren't expecting to have to tackle someone on an up-the-gut dive, effectively removing strategy again.
But for most Americans, the best part of football are all the chips, and hamburgers, and hot dogs, and beer you can eat with your buddies.
And you just don't have enough nearly time to properly gorge yourself at a hockey game.
There's too much action for that.
What We Learned
Anaheim Ducks: Even Teemu Selanne(notes) is getting sick of Teemu Selanne retirement talk. Said the greatest goal-scorer of his generation, "That (mental) approach works well for me, because I want to leave it all on the ice. But nobody's going to believe me anymore, are they?"
Atlanta Thrashers: The past two summers, Angelo Esposito(notes) has had surgery on the ACL in his right knee. That's a lot of knee surgery for a 21-year-old kid, and not a good sign for his development. The Marian Hossa(notes) trade looks worse all the time.
Boston Bruins: Peter Chiarelli says Marc Savard is in "a good frame of mind." This could be because his concussion problemshave made him forget how the entire organization scrambled to throw him under the bus in July.
Buffalo Sabres: The Sabres marketing team is top-notch. Everyone likes their new jerseys so much they almost forget the team is total garbage.
Calgary Flames: Darryl Sutter says "somebody isn't going to be happy" when camp wraps at the end of September. That somebody, I assume, Flames fans.
Carolina Hurricanes: Rod Brind'Amour's(notes) new job with the Hurricanes is officially "Director of Forwards Development." First step: develop a way to get Chad LaRose(notes) off the second line.
Chicago Blackhawks:The Blackhawks will broadcast five of their seven preseason games on local TV this month. In related news, today will be three one-hundredths of a second shorter because of a shift in the Earth's rotation generated by the force with which Bill Wirtz is currently spinning in his grave.
Colorado Avalanche: Peter Mueller's(notes) signing still didn't get the Avs above the cap floor. They're short about $112,000. Dan Ellis(notes) problems?
Columbus Blue Jackets: The Blue Jackets' unofficial phrase that pays this season: "Hardcore Hockey." Because when all else fails, Rick Nash(notes) might smash Jimmy Howard(notes) over the head with a kendo stick.
Dallas Stars:"New-look Dallas Stars base hopes on youngsters, projects," says the headline. Or if you prefer, "New-look Dallas Stars to miss playoffs again."
Detroit Red Wings: Justin Abdelkader(notes) took up boxing training in the offseason. He probably didn't expect he'd have to fight Mike Modano(notes) for ice time.
Edmonton Oilers:Andrew Cogliano(notes) says he's gotten better at faceoffs. But I don't see how that helps him since he's going to be a healthy scratch most of the year.
Florida Panthers:The Panthers have a new P.A. guy this season, who also voices ads against drunk driving in which he asks, "Have you been drinking tonight, sir?" For Panthers fans who paid to watch that team, the answer is likely, "Yes."
Los Angeles Kings: And now a chat with Alexei Ponikarovsky(notes), in which he is not asked what it feels like to be a consolation prize, and rather a shabby one at that.
Minnesota Wild: Darby Hendrickson(notes) has joined the Wild as an assistant coach. His qualifications, apart from being in the NHL for 10 seasons, is that he was the best high-school hockey player in Minnesota in 1991. You gotta love how much the franchise bends over backwards to appeal to its fans that way.
Montreal Canadiens: Fans in Montreal have had it rough, since the franchise hasn't won a Stanley Cup in almost two decades. On the Habs' 200th anniversary, they will only hold 14 ceremonies to honor last year's team.
Nashville Predators: The Preds are really proud of all their excellent D prospects. Now if only they'd draft a forward.
New Jersey Devils: So many words about waiving Brain Rolston. I didn't count but I think it was almost a million.
New York Islanders: Rick DiPietro is actually going to participate in training camp this year. "He can just go out and play and not have any physical issues," Garth Snow noted. Not for the first 20 minutes anyway. Maybe.
New York Rangers: Rangers fans are excited about the team possibly signing free agent Garnett Exelby. I don't even have a joke for that. They are. And that's sad.
Ottawa Senators: In case you were wondering, there is indeed a new Senators Goalie of the Future: Robin Lehner(notes). But this one's gonna MAKE IT!
Philadelphia Flyers: Matt Carle(notes) traveled all over this summer, with stops in Bora Bora and Alaska, among other places. This season he'll get to visit tourist hot spots like Uniondale, Buffalo and Pittsburgh. What a life.
Phoenix Coyotes: Brandon Gormley: Coach-talkin'."Just play your game, I think. You're here for a reason, and they want to see that, and it's obvious you have to step up your game. It's harder competition, and everyone's fighting for a job here, so you've just got to go prove yourself." Insight.
Pittsburgh Penguins: With some of the earliest actual hockey highlights of the young preseason, we get our first dirty hit/stretchering off at 55 seconds.
San Jose Sharks: The Sharks signed about 400 college free agents last spring and Todd McLellan is excited to see an indeterminate number of them play in this rookie camp. Which ones? Don't worry about that.
St. Louis Blues: This penny-pinching team with its terrible owner might be a penny-pinching team with a new, and only possibly-terrible owner by the end of the year.
Tampa Bay Lightning: The Bolts' rookies participated in a 16-round shootout. That's a lot of rounds.
Toronto Maple Leafs: Leafs predictions in the comic pages. Sure, why not? Bonus points if you can figure out why this strip is popular or considered funny.
Vancouver Canucks: Jordan Schroeder(notes) might stick with the big club. But as the article points out, Canucks Rookies That Might Make the Team have a tendency of, y'know, not doing that.
Washington Capitals: Marcus Johansson(notes) is expected to be the star at Caps rookie camp. Sucks to be you, Johann Kroll.
Gold Star Award
Magnus Paajarvi-Svensson was unstoppable in the Canucks/Oilers rookie camp game I watched. He's going to be phenomenal.
Minus of the Weekend
I was so happy to watch live hockey games yesterday that I can't be mad at anyone.
Perfect HFBoards trade proposal of the week
User "mrinsane" is shuffling the deck chairs.
To Montreal: Kyle Beach(notes), Steve Bernier(notes), Nick Bjugstad
To Florida: Jaroslav Spacek(notes), Jack Skille(notes), Andrei Kostitsyn(notes)
To Chicago: Rotislav Olesz, Travis Moen(notes)
This is good from where I sit.
Signoff
What's Spanish for "I know you speak English?"
Ryan Lambert publisheshockey awesomeness rather infrequently over at The Two-Line Pass. Check it out, why don't you? Or you can e-mail him here and follow him on Twitter if you so desire.
Related: Chris Pronger, Teemu Selanne, Magnus Paajarvi-Svensson, Rod Brind'Amour, Justin Abdelkader, Kyle Beach, Mike Modano, Peter Mueller, Andrew Cogliano, Jack Skille, Jimmy Howard, Steve Bernier, Chad LaRose, Rick Nash, Dan Ellis, Alexei Ponikarovsky, Marian Hossa, Marc Savard, Anaheim Ducks, Atlanta Thrashers, Boston Bruins, Buffalo Sabres, Carolina Hurricanes, Calgary Flames, Chicago Blackhawks, Columbus Blue Jackets, Colorado Avalanche, Dallas Stars, Detroit Red Wings, Edmonton Oilers, Florida Panthers, Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota Wild, Montreal Canadiens, Nashville Predators, New Jersey Devils, New York Islanders, New York Rangers, Ottawa Senators, Philadelphia Flyers, Phoenix Coyotes, Pittsburgh Penguins, San Jose Sharks, St. Louis Blues, Tampa Bay Lightning, Toronto Maple Leafs, Vancouver Canucks, Washington Capitals, Hockey Fans, Puck Videos
Interesting argument ...
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Friday, September 10, 2010
Thursday, September 09, 2010
Tuesday, September 07, 2010
Monday, September 06, 2010
Canada First Nation to Declare BPA a Toxic Substance
Canada is taking an historic step by becoming the first nation to add the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) to its official register of toxic substances.
BPA is the primary component in hard, clear polycarbonate plastics that are used in thousands of everyday consumer products such as baby bottles, CDs and DVDs, and the linings of food and beverage cans. Numerous studies have shown that BPA can cause or contribute to health problems ranging from heart disease and diabetes in adults to impaired brain and hormone development in children.
BPA is so pervasive, and present in so many products people use every day, that the chemical leaches into our food and water, and even permeates our skin. A report last week by Statistics Canada showed that 91 percent of people tested had BPA in their urine, with the highest concentrations found in children. Those results are consistent with previous studies conducted in the United States.
In 2009, when the Canadian government first proposed listing BPA as a toxic substance, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) demanded a formal review of the proposal, accused the Canadian government of pandering to "emotional zealots," and said that any designation of BPA as toxic would not be "based on the best available data and scientific knowledge." Canadian minister Jim Prentice rejected ACC demands, saying that the organization had failed to "bring forth any new scientific data or information" to support its request for a board of review.
Canada had already banned the sale of baby bottles that contain BPA in 2008, and while the new action would make it the world's first nation to list BPA as a toxic substance Canada is not alone in its concern about the chemical's possible adverse health effects.
In May, France approved a ban on manufacturing, importing, exporting or selling baby bottles made with plastics that contain BPA. Denmark has banned the use of BPA in any materials that come into contact with food and beverages, and Sweden is considering a similar ban. Several U.S. states have banned baby bottles and other children's products that contain BPA, and U.S. government agencies continue to study and review the overall safety of using BPA in consumer products.
On the other hand, Germany declined to take action to ban or reduce consumer exposure to BPA after the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment cited two studies that found the chemical was no hazardous to human health.
The controversy over BPA is bound to continue for some time, as more studies are conducted and new information comes to light about the potential or proven health effects of exposure to the chemical. Meanwhile, consumers in most countries are left without definitive answers and must decide for themselves whether they want to do as much as they can to reduce their exposure to BPA.
Also Read:
Ms. Cheap: As weather cools, art, music scenes heat up | tennessean.com | The Tennessean
Ms. Cheap: As weather cools, art, music scenes heat up
Fall fun includes music, art and outdoors
September 6, 2010
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-->-->The Ms. Cheap Guide to Fall continues today with my best bets for free music, outdoor activities and art between now and Thanksgiving. Enjoy!
Music
• The Lightning 100 Live on the Green free outdoor concert series on Nashville's Public Square Plaza is at 6 p.m. Thursdays through Oct. 14. Tonic and Five for Fighting open the series this week. Other highlights include Dr. Dog on Sept. 16 and Band of Horses Oct. 7. Details: www.liveonthe green.net.
• Vanderbilt's Blair School of Music is always a destination for music lovers. Here are some of the fall's best offerings:
The monthly Blair Nightcap Series (Sept. 14 and Oct. 21) is a standout for those who want to listen and learn. A pre-concert talk at 8 p.m. is followed by a
50-minute music program at
8:30 p.m., all in the Steve and Judy Turner Recital Hall at Blair. There's even free valet parking.Related
The Blair Presents series has two great offerings on the calendar. On Oct. 3 at 4 p.m. it's "A very special conversation with Jim Foglesong,"with singer-songwriter, Tennessean music columnist and Blair lecturer Peter Cooper interviewing Music City music business legend Foglesong. And on Oct. 4, at 8 p.m. it's "An Extraordinary Evening with The Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quintet" in Ingram Hall at Blair.
On Oct. 10 and 11, Blair presents a Celebration of Robert Schumann, honoring the 200th year since the composer's birth. The concerts are at 3 p.m. Oct. 10 and 8 p.m. Oct. 11 in Ingram Hall.
On Sept. 16, the Vanderbilt Orchestra and Vanderbilt Wind Symphony present From Bach to Birdland, four centuries of innovative composers in Ingram Hall.
-->(2 of 5)
A Dulcimer Afternoon,featuring Karen Mueller and others,is set for2 p.m. Sept. 26 at Blair.
See The Merry Wives of Windsorpresented by Vanderbilt Opera Theater and Vanderbilt Orchestra at 8 p.m. Nov. 12 and 2 p.m. Nov. 14 in Ingram Hall at Blair. This production is fully staged and costumed, and sung in English.
Details about these concerts and other Blair events: 322-7651 or http://blair.vanderbilt.edu
• Belmont University's fall music calendar is also impressive.
Related
The Belmont Camerata Musicale chamber music ensemble has two fall concerts in the Belmont Mansion — one at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 27 and one at 7:30 p.m. Oct 25.
Belmont will present the Woods Piano Concert Series, an all-Steinway school celebration and performance by Cliburn silver medalist Yeol Eum Son, at
7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Belmont Heights Baptist Church.On Nov. 1 at 7:30 p.m. there's the 2010 Fall Choral Institute Concert with the Oratorio Chorus, Belmont Chorale and regional high school choirs performing Schubert's Mass in G and Make Our Garden by Leonard Bernstein in Massey Concert Hall.
On top of all that, there's a Faculty Jazz Group concert at
7:30 Sept. 20 in Massey Concert Hall; a Concert Band Concert at noon on Oct. 1 in Massey Atrium; and a 3 p.m. carillon concert on Oct. 3, featuring Richard Shadinger, at the Bell Tower in the center of campus. For details on all these concerts: 460-6408.• Trevecca Nazarene University's Symphony Orchestra Concert is at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 21 in the Boone Building on campus, and Trevecca's Master Chorale Fall Concert is at 4 p.m. Nov. 7 at Bellevue Presbyterian Church. In addition, the Trevecca's Madrigalians and Trevecca Symphony Orchestra concert is at 7:30 Nov. 11 at the Cathedral of the Incarnation. Details on these concerts: 248-1288.
• Lipscomb University has a Jazz Concert Series concert at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 14 featuring the University Jazz Band and Jazz Vocal Ensemble. On Nov. 15, Lipscomb hosts the Christian High School Choral Festival at 7 p.m., featuring choral ensembles from several Christian high schools. All are in Collins Auditorium.
-->(3 of 5)
Lipscomb also has a Faculty and Friends Concert Series with concerts at 8 p.m. Sept. 13 and 21 in Ward Hall and at 7 p.m. Sept. 30 in Collins Auditorium. Details on the Lipscomb concerts: 966-5929.
• The Fisk Jubilee Singers will perform at 10 a.m. Oct. 6 as part of the Jubilee Day Convocation in Fisk Memorial Chapel on the Fisk University campus. Details: 329-8744.
• Middle Tennessee State University's department of music has a good fall concert lineup that includes the MTSU Wind Ensemble at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 24; the MTSU Women's Chorale at 3 p.m. Oct. 10; MTSU Symphony Orchestra at 4 p.m. Oct. 24 and the Stones River Chamber Playersat 7:30 p.m. Nov. 15. All concerts in Hinton Hall, Wright Music Building on the MTSU campus. Details: 898-2493
• Metro Parks' Victor Chatman's Brown Bag Lunch Special concert seriesis at the Centennial Park event shelter from 11:30 a.m.-
1:30 p.m. on the second and fourth Thursdays through mid-November. Dates include: Lakewood Blues and Jazz Band on Thursday; Rock Williams Band on Sept. 23; Diane Marino Band on Oct. 14; The Higher Ground Band on Oct. 28; and an All-Star Finale Tribute to Veterans on Nov. 11. Details: 578-7525.Related
• The Metro Library Summer Lunchtime Concert series runs 11:45 a.m.-1 p.m. Tuesdays through Oct. 5 in the courtyard at the Main Library, 615 Church St. Dates include: Jonell Mosser on Tuesday; Three Tenors of Take 6 on Sept. 14; Serenatta on Sept. 21; Chris Casello Trio on Sept. 28; and Radio Daze on Oct. 5. Validated parking available in the Seventh Avenue garage. Details: 862-5755 or www.library.nashville.org.
• The Williamson County Community Bandhas five fall concerts. The community band plays marches, concert pieces and jazz. Dates include 5 p.m. Sunday at the Franklin Recreation Complex at 1120 Hillsboro Road in Franklin;
5 p.m. Sept. 25 at Thompson's Station Park; 3 p.m. Oct. 10 at the Brentwood Public Library, on Concord Road in Brentwood; and
3 p.m. Nov. 14 at the Franklin Rec complex at 1120 Hillsboro Road in Franklin. Details 790-5719, ext. 30 or www.wcparksandrec.com-->(4 of 5)
• Several Middle Tennessee wineriesoffer a chance totake a picnic, taste some wine (or not) and enjoy live music. Beachaven Winery in Clarksville has a Jazz on the Lawn concert series on scattered Saturday nights through Oct. 23. Details: www.beachavenwinery.com or 931-645-8867; The Sumner Crest Winery in Portland has concerts about once a month through October; www.sumnercrestwinery.com or 325-4086. Arrington Vineyards in Arrington also has outdoor music most Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Details: www.arringtonvineyards.com or 395-0102.
Art
• There's a monthlyFirst Saturday Art Crawl, when downtown art galleries host receptions and art openings. Most galleries serve free wine and snacks. There are even free shuttles to take you between the galleries. Details: www.
nashvilledowntown.com or call 254-2040.• The Nashville Association of Art Dealers continues its citywide First Thursday Art After Hours event from 5-8 p.m. at area galleries, including Local Color, Zeitgeist, Cumberland Gallery, The Parthenon and others. Most are free. Details: 321-3141
• The Centennial Art Center Staff & Students' Holiday Season Art Exhibition & Sale has an opening reception 5-7 p.m. Nov. 5. The show will be up through mid-December in Centennial Park's Art Activity Center. Details: 862-8442.
Related
• The Tennessee Association of Craft Artists' TACA Biennial: The Best of Tennessee Craft exhibition is Sept. 27-Oct. 15 at MTSU. The event, which shows off art from across the state, will include trompe l'oeil artist Sylvia Hyman, furniture maker Craig Nutt and mixed-media artist Sherri Warner Hunter. There's an opening reception, hosted by MTSU, with First Lady Andrea Conte, 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. at Todd Gallery on Oct. 4. Details: www.tennesseecrafts.org or mtsu.edu/art.
-->(5 of 5)
Outdoors
• Check out Metro Parks' four nature centers for everything from free tree programs (including "Tree Day" on Oct. 16) at Warner Nature Center and bird and bat programs at Shelby Park to a family camp night and a Farm Day at Bells Bend Outdoor Center, and a night hike at Beaman Park. All four centers have interesting programs, walks and hikes for every level — even cart tours for people with limited mobility. Details: www.
nashville.gov/parks/nature or 352-6299.• Walk, run, skate or bike the greenways. Nashville, Murfreesboro and other communities have extensive greenway routes. Go to www.nashville.gov/green
ways or www.
murfreesborotn.gov/parks.• Murfreesboro Parks and Rec's Wilderness Stationhas a series ofsenior fall hikes that start at 9 a.m. on Oct. 26, Nov. 2 and Nov. 9. Wilderness Station also has anAnimal Encounter program most Saturdays for children of all ages from 1:30 to 2 p.m., where you get to meet a different animal each week. Call for specific dates. Kids 8 and older can also become turtle researchers (from 9 to
11 a.m. on Sept. 28, Oct. 5 and 12) to help collect data on turtles, which are being listed as a "species of concern" in our state. Details on these Wilderness Station programs: 217-3017.• South Cumberland State Park, which includes Stone Door, Savage Gulf and Grundy Lake, has a calendar that is full of ranger-led nature hikes, canoeing, scavenger hunts and children's nature programs. Details: 931-924-2980.
Related
Hope all of this helps you stay cheap this fall!
Reach Ms. Cheap at 615-259-8282 or mscheap@tennessean.com. Check her out at facebook.com/
mscheap and on her blog at Tennessean.com/mscheap.
Some useful stuff here ...
Sunday, September 05, 2010
Take Heed, Tech Giants: Edison’s Failed Plot To Hijack Hollywood | Epicenter | Wired.com
In essence, Edison’s forces thought that they could dominate their industry via legal control over technology, in tandem with a cynical alliance with morals groups.
Interesting article, follow link to read it all.
Take Heed, Tech Giants: Edison’s Failed Plot To Hijack Hollywood | Epicenter | Wired.com
In essence, Edison’s forces thought that they could dominate their industry via legal control over technology, in tandem with a cynical alliance with morals groups.
Interesting article, follow link to read it all.
The Ping Problems: Is Apple To Blame, Or The Music Labels?
This article covers some of my sentiment towards Ping pretty well. I RARELY if EVER buy from iTunes, but I use the software a ton for managing and listening to my library. Ping doesn't offer a lot for users like me.
Saturday, September 04, 2010
Grins Invites All to Vegetarian-Kosher Gourmet Dinner | Bites | Nashville Scene
Grins, the vegetarian kosher cafe on Vanderbilt campus that is also part of the Bongo Java empire, has a festive seasonal dinner coming up. It will mark two different new year celebrations — the start of the school year and also the Jewish new year, Rosh Hashanah.Chef Rusty Johnson has come up with a creative menu that is both vegetarian and kosher, and a pretty good deal, as well, with four courses for $30 (tax and tip not included). The dinner is at 6:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 12.
The meal will start with house-made focaccia with fresh herb butter, followed by: chilled sweet corn soup with basil, mint and chili oil; cornmeal-battered okra and Vidalia onion fritter with heirloom tomato, green goddess dressing and sumac; stone-baked pizzetta with baby lima puree, Juliet tomato, garlic confit, parmesan and parsley; and for dessert, a dark chocolate-clementine pot de crème with vanilla bean whipped cream.
Vegan versions of all courses are available on request. For beverages, organic Bongo Java coffee and Numi Iced Tea will be served. You may bring your own bottle of wine, as long as it is certified kosher.
Make reservations by contacting amanda@bongojava.com. Grins is in Vanderbilt’s Ben Schulman Center for Jewish Life, at 25th Avenue and Vanderbilt Place, across from Memorial Gym.
I've eaten here and loved it. This sounds fab!
Friday, September 03, 2010
Thursday, September 02, 2010
Wednesday, September 01, 2010
United Record Pressing - Nothing but vinyl since 1949
Such a cool idea: "We'd like to offer one free test pressing for every person
who donates $50 or more to your cause!"
Expect a worse downtown rush hour Thursday - Nashville Business Journal
Downtown workers might want to escape the office a little early Thursday night, because the evening rush hour promises to be even worse than normal. The Metro Nashville Police Department issued a traffic warning for Thursday, saying that a trifecta of downtown events is likely to tangle streets, especially around LP Field. The Woodland Street Bridge will close at 4:30 p.m. The extra congestion will come coutesy of the 7 p.m. Titans preseason game versus the Saints; the last ever Brooks & Dunn concert, at Bridgestone Arena at 7:30 p.m.; and an Opry Country Classic show at Ryman Auditorium at 7 p.m.
More details from the police department:
By 4:30 p.m., the Woodland Street Bridge will close to regular traffic and be available only to pedestrians and shuttle buses. Police officers will staff a number of intersections in the downtown area to keep traffic moving and assist pedestrians.
Fans traveling downtown for the game and who normally park in state employee lots on game days will not have access to those lots Thursday evening until 5 p.m., when they are vacated by state workers.
Fans parking north of Broadway, and those who use state parking lots, can safely walk across the Woodland Street Bridge from downtown to LP Field.
For fans parking along and south of Broadway, the Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge will provide safe, enjoyable, and easy access to the stadium.
Additional downtown-area parking information can be found at parkitdowntown.com.
Gates to LP Field will open at 5 p.m. Thursday. Stadium parking lots will open at 3 p.m. to Titans fans with parking passes. Football fans are reminded that only persons with parking passes will be allowed to park on the stadium campus. Fans without parking passes who drive to the LP Field campus will be turned away. Those fans are urged to save time, find parking in the downtown area, and walk to LP Field or ride an InShuttle Transportation shuttle bus.
InShuttle will provide park and ride bus service for this game from the state parking lots at 4th Avenue North & Harrison Street, from 10th Circle North downtown (off Charlotte across from TSU’s downtown campus), and from Greer Stadium beginning at 5:30 p.m.
The Korean War Veterans Memorial Bridge (Gateway Bridge), which connects East Nashville to 4th Avenue North, will be open to eastbound and westbound traffic until moments before the conclusion of each game this season. However, there will be no access to the LP Field campus to eastbound traffic coming across the bridge from the downtown area in the two-hour period before each game (eastbound vehicles coming across the bridge will not be allowed to turn left onto the LP Field campus).
Shortly before the conclusion of the Brooks & Dunn concert, officers will staff intersections around Bridgestone Arena, as well as Broadway immediately in front of the building, to move traffic out of downtown as efficiently as possible while assisting pedestrians cross streets.
Given these three very large events on Thursday, citizens are asked to be patient and understanding as police officers work to direct the thousands of vehicles to the interstate system and other major routes leading away from downtown.
Careful out there Nasties!
Chris Chelios retires after 26 NHL seasons, three Stanley Cups - ESPN
Chris Chelios officially retires from NHL
DETROIT -- Chris Chelios, the longest-tenured defenseman in NHL history, is finally hanging up his skates.
Chelios
After 26 NHL seasons and three Stanley Cups, Chelios announced his retirement Tuesday at the age of 48.
"I guess I've been dreading this day for a long time," he said at a news conference in Detroit.
Chelios, who won three Norris Trophies during a career that included stops in Montreal, Chicago, Detroit and Atlanta, will become an adviser with the Red Wings. His new job will include working with Detroit's front office and coaching staffs while helping to develop and mentor young players.
In NHL history, only Hall of Famer Gordie Howe was older than Chelios when he played, skating at 52 for the Hartford Whalers during the 1979-80 season almost a decade after leaving the Red Wings.
Chelios is also the only player in NHL history to appear in at least 400 games with three different teams.
Known for his strict workout regimen and surprising endurance given his age, he played the fourth-most regular-season games in NHL history (1,651) and the most postseason games in NHL history (266).
Chelios said he has "nothing left in the tank."
Chelios represented the U.S. on four Olympic hockey teams, including three as team captain -- in 1984, in 1998, the silver medal-winning team in 2002 and in 2006. He spent seven seasons with the Canadiens before being traded to his hometown Blackhawks in June 1990. He played nine seasons there before being traded to the conference rival Red Wings.
He was limited to 28 games with Detroit during the 2008-09 regular season because of a broken leg suffered during an exhibition game and the Wings chose not to bring him back following season. Not ready to retire just yet, Chelios signed a few months later with the Chicago Wolves of the American Hockey League and in March was recalled by the Thrashers, where he appeared in seven games.
"I loved every minute of it," he said of his long career.
Chelios, who ranks second all-time among defensemen with 2,891 penalty minutes, had this to say Tuesday to the fans of opposing teams: "I hope you'll forgive me for the things I did to some of the players on your teams."
Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press
Hated him as a Hawk, loved him as a Wing. What a career!
