IU receives $345,000 grant for pre-college strings program\nIU's School of Music announced May 13 that it received a three-year, $345,000 grant from the Dorothy Richard Starling Foundation to continue developing the IU String Academy. The academy is designed for children aged five to 18 to study violin, viola, cello, bass and double bass. The vigorous curriculum includes private lessons, chamber music and performance opportunities.\n"We are very grateful to the Starling Foundation for honoring the String Academy and recognizing the value of music instruction in a child's early development," Mimi Zweig, IU professor of violin and viola, said in a news release. Zweig is the director of the string academy and a pioneer of children's music programs. \n"It's our hope that whether a child develops into a professional musician or goes on to pursue another career, he or she will take with them a love and understanding of music developed over many years of study," she said.\nThe premier ensemble from the String Academy is the Violin Virtuosi, a group of 20 musicians from the age of 10 to 18 who perform as a group and solo. Eight members of the group have been invited to France to perform in Le Mans, Cholet and Paris. There will be a free concert for the public before the musicians depart for France; the Violin Virtuosi will perform at the IU School of Music's Recital Hall at 1 p.m. May 24.
History professor publishes book\nJohn Bodnar, IU Chancellor's professor of history and chair of the history department, recently published a book concerned with Hollywood's portrayal of working-class Americans. The book, entitled "Blue-Collar Hollywood: Liberalism, Democracy and Working People in American Film," was published by Johns Hopkins University Press.\nThe 319-page book is concerned with the Hollywood blacklist, censorship, attitudes toward labor movements, racism and the placement of women in the workforce and society.\n"I am interested in how filmmakers addressed the American political tradition of liberalism (the individual) versus democracy (the community)," Bodnar said in a news release.
sh: Ricky Martin to release album in Spanish
LOS ANGELES -- Ricky Martin is back with a new album he hopes will sway those who wrote him off as a one-hit wonder.\nMartin's 1999 smash hit, "Livin' La Vida Loca" sold 15 million copies worldwide, but his 2000 follow up, "Sound Loaded" dropped to 4 million.\nHis latest, "Almas del Silencio" (Souls of Silence), hits stores Tuesday. It's the first Spanish-language album for Martin, 31, in five years. It's also more introspective than much of his recent work.\n"I really needed to go back to my focus, to my center, to the beginning," said Martin, who got his start 20 years ago as a child star in the Puerto Rican teen group Menudo. "I had the need to search within, and really dig deep, and find those emotions that, because of the adrenaline and the euphoria that I lived for a couple of years, were probably sabotaged."\nAs for "Livin' La Vida Loca," Martin said he doesn't miss it at all: "I lived it. I loved it. But it's the past."
sh: Rushdie Content to Talk About Books
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil -- Salman Rushdie would be content to talk about books -- just books. For the author of "The Satanic Verses," that hasn't often been the case.\n"I would very happily not discuss radical Islam any time in the near future, but it is a part of my life that I have obviously had to think a great deal about," Rushdie said Friday.\nRushdie was in Rio to launch the Portuguese edition of his most recent novel, "Fury."\nIn 1989, Rushdie was forced into hiding for nine years after the late Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called on Muslims around the world to kill the novelist because "The Satanic Verses" had allegedly insulted Islam.\nIn 1998, the Iranian government declared it would not support the de facto death sentence but could not rescind the edict. Under Islamic law, that could only be done by Khomeini, who died in 1989.\n"I do think that gradually, I'm happy to say, the emphasis is shifting back and more and more people do seem interested in talking about my books," Rushdie said.\n"Fury," which is set in New York, again thrust Rushdie into the question of radical Islam. The book was released in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, the day suicide hijackers crashed planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon.\n"Even though the book is quite critical of New York, people respond to it as a lost city that they loved," he said.
