Britney Spears has been taken to hospital by ambulance for the second time in a month, according to the Associated Press.

An anonymous Los Angeles police source reportedly said the pop star was being taken to “get help”, but did not say where the ambulance was taking her.

The celebrity gossip website TMZ said Spears was being taken from her Beverley Hills mansion to UCLA medical center where she would be placed under California’s Code 5150, which means she is considered to pose a danger to herself and others.

Spears was admitted to Cedars-Sinai medical center in Los Angeles earlier this month after refusing to hand over her children to her former husband Kevin Federline, in breach of a court order. She was kept in involuntary psychiatric hold and released after being visited by a psychiatrist.

Doctors have called for her to receive treatment for drug addiction and hereditary mental illness exacerbated by a troubled childhood. There were reports that the singer was suffering from bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression.

Earlier this month it emerged that her paternal grandmother committed suicide at the age of 31 after being depressed for several years.

Spear’s mental health problems come amid a stressful custody battle with her ex-husband over their two sons, two-year-old Sean Preston and 15-month-old Jayden James.

Federline was granted temporary custody, and Spears lost her visiting rights as a result of refusing to hand the boys back earlier this month.

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Rod Stewart knows about it. So does Elton John. And Barry Manilow. Tony Bennett, to his joy and surprise, is just finding out about it. And next year Earth, Wind and Fire will get in on the act.

The chart-topping but ageing artists have all been on the receiving end of help from their peers. The latest US research shows baby boomers and beyond now account for the largest share of music buyers. Figures compiled by the Recording Industry Association of America show that consumers over 45 accounted for 25% of music sales last year, more than twice the share of any other age group, and up from 15% a decade ago. Perhaps most surprisingly, the over-50s were responsible for 24% of the music industry’s online sales.

Now the AARP, which used to go under the less racy name of the American Association of Retired Persons, is to sponsor a concert tour for the first time - by the 80-year-old Tony Bennett. The endorsement follows the success of Bennett’s latest album. Duets: An American Classic has sold just under 650,000 copies in the three weeks since its release, making it the biggest seller of his career.

“Tony is the perfect musical ambassador for AARP,” said Shereen Remez, the organisation’s group executive membership officer for member value. “He proves that age is just a number and life is what you make it.”

The AARP - motto “The power to make it better” - is also enjoying something of a boom. Billing itself as America’s “largest membership organisation”, the AARP boasts more than 35 million members aged over 50. That figure is expected to rise to 70 million in the next decade.

Their growing numbers call into question some of the traditional tenets of marketing. While some marketers in the past have dismissed the over-50s to concentrate on the disposable income of the under-30s, demographic changes are turning that wisdom on its head. As people live longer, have more money and are increasingly active in retirement, so their disposable income has become a target.

Evidence of the boomers’ retail clout includes a recent platinum-selling James Taylor CD. Taylor, 58, listed in the AARP magazine’s hottest people under the category “babelicious baldies”, also features in Amazon.com’s list of the 10 top-selling CDs, alongside contemporaries like Eric Clapton, 61, and JJ Cale, 67.

Businesses are developing to cope with the boomers’ demand for live music, too. The House of Blues chain offers wine tasting and pre-show dinners at some venues.

Last month Elton John, 59, performed at the AARP’s Life@50+ convention in southern California. For next year’s event in Boston, the organisation has booked Rod Stewart, 61, and Earth, Wind and Fire.

Some acts, however, harbour a reluctance to be associated with the AARP. “The problem is going to be getting the artists to allow, next to their name, those four feared initials,” Jonny Podell, 60, a talent agent who books appearances for artists including Alice Cooper, 58, and Peter Gabriel, 56, told the New York Times. “I’m the agent for half a dozen acts they’re going to want. Short of saying, ‘In addition to your normal fee we’re giving you $1m in cash,’ I don’t think they’d have one taker.”

Danny Bennett, Tony Bennett’s son and manager, said the crooner was the perfect role model for the over-50s. “This is a generation that is determined to stay young forever,” he said.

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The music industry has rules governing the way that music can now be shared with consumers. With the ease of accessing the internet it has become easier and easier for consumers to just download music from the comfort of their own homes, rather than going to a store and buying a compact disc. Because of this, there are now rules in place preventing the free downloads of songs off the internet. Now, the only legal way to download music from the internet is to pay for it on secure sites.

The music industry has strict rules in place when it comes to piracy and downloading music illegally. If someone is caught downloading or with illegally downloaded music, they can receive a hefty fine and a possible jail term. If you still want to download music from your computer and the internet, the best way to avoid getting yourself into trouble, you need to find a reputable website that sells music packages in a legal manner.

Another way that the music industry has implemented rules is on the use of music for commercial purposes. Instead of just being able to put a popular song or a piece of music into a commercial or on a film score, you must first purchase the royalty rights to it. By doing this you avoid any fines and penalties that can occur from “stealing†music. Because music is so popular in commercial and media outlets, many websites have met that growing need by supplying royalty-free music.

With the mass production of music and the ease of which it can now be purchased, many more rules and stricter laws governing it have come about. With the ease of downloading music off the internet now, consumers need to make sure that they are downloading legal copies of songs and not pirated music from people just wanting to make a quick buck. By purchasing music from legal sites, consumers will avoid any fines that can occur from having pirated music in their possession. The increasing use of popular music in commercial and media outlets has also made the need for rules in that area a top priority as well.

Article Source: http://www.articleset.com

About the Author

Royalty Free Music by UniqueTracks provides stock, background, and classical royalty free music. » Read more articles by John Bickerton

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Celia Cruz, the undisputed diva of salsa and one of the greatest performers in the history of Afro-Cuban music, has died of a brain tumor at the age of 77.

Her husband of 41 years, Pedro Knight, was by her side at her home in New Jersey. She had been ill for months.

Along with the percussionist Tito Puente, with whom she worked for many years, the flamboyant Cruz was largely responsible for the worldwide popularity of salsa.

She was hailed as one the greatest female singers of the 20th century, the Latin equivalent to Aretha Franklin or Ella Fitzgerald, but as a Cuban based in the US it was inevitable that she was also seen as a political symbol.

To the 700,000 Cuban exiles in Miami she was a stalwart of the anti-Castro movement.

She had been in poor health since undergoing surgery last December, and premature reports of her death on Miami radio stations in recent weeks led to public displays of grief.

According to media reports, her body will be taken to Miami, where a huge memorial service is expected.

Cruz had a remarkable history. It is thought that she was born in 1925 in a poor part of Havana, though she remained tight-lipped about her age for most of her life.

She originally planned to become a teacher but that changed when her cousin entered her for a radio talent show, which she won.

After a series of amateur appearances, and studies at the Havana Conservatory of Music, she became lead singer with one of Havana’s great bands, the Sonora Matancera, in 1950.

At first the public resisted her appeal, because she was taking over from the star singer Myrta Silva.

But by the final years of the Batista era she was a star herself, performing at clubs like the legendary Tropicana at a time when Havana had become a corrupt center for well-heeled American gangsters.

Here she first recorded songs that were to become salsa standards, and met Pedro Knight, then a trumpeter with the band and later her husband and manager.

Life for Sonora Matancera, changed after Castro’s revolution in 1959, and the next year they all defected.

Celia Cruz was never allowed to return to Cuba again, because, she said, “Castro never forgave me.”

In the US she began building a new career with the help of Knight, whom she married in 1962.

At first she found it difficult - young Cubans in the US were more interested in the Beatles or US rock bands - but by the 70s they were rediscovering their roots, and Celia Cruz.

She went on to work with the great US-based Latin musicians, from Willie Colon to the Fania All-Stars, and developed a flamboyant stage show in which she made use of outrageous costumes and wigs and her trademark cry of � azucar! (sugar).

She recorded more than 70 albums, and won numerous awards, remaining a formidable performer to the end.

Now, with her death, a classic era for Latin music has come to an end.

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It’s a sad fact that most people, including piano players, regard music theory and harmony as some abstract concept that has very little to do with the songs they play on their pianos. Nothing could be further from the truth. Knowing music theory and harmony is the key to opening a whole new world of exciting insights into the songs we play, and enable us to do things on the piano we never dreamed we could do, to say nothing of enjoying the process a hundred times more.
What is music theory, and how can I benefit?

Here are just a few of the wonderful skills and insights a person benefits from by learning music theory:
How notation works — a huge advantage in sight-reading.

The hierarchy of rhythm — solving rhythm problems before they begin.

All kinds of scales — the “ladders of notes” every song is composed of. Major scales, 3 types of minor scales, chromatic scales, whole tone scales, modal scales.

How transposition and modulation works — playing songs in different keys, and getting from one key to another smoothly.

Complex time signatures, and what they tell you.

Perfect, major & minor intervals — helps ear training greatly.

Two-part and four-part harmony.

Figured bass such as IV, V7, ii6, I6/4, etc. and how it relates to chord symbols such as Fm7, F6, Dmaj7, etc.

Harmonizing melodies with all these chords.

Open & close voicing, inversions, secondary chords, form, cadences, non-harmonic tones, arranging for voices, arranging for brass, arranging for strings, transposing instruments, key relationships and many other exciting insights into the inner workings of music!
But what is harmony?

Harmony is a sub-set of music theory. It is a series of notes in combination, played simultaneously. Listen to your favorite songs, and pay close attention to the back-up vocals when they’re being sung along with the lead. Can you hear how the two vocal melodies differ in pitch? That’s harmony, and it’s highly possible that those back-up vocalists were chosen because of their strong ability to harmonize.

Singing a harmony, or rather picking one out on your own without written sheet music, is an almost inherent musical skill that many singers would die to possess. But harmony isn’t just the province of singers; it’s found in every single area of music. Any time a sound is layered on top of another sound and those sounds match each other in rhythm and melody (but not pitch), a harmony is created.

Harmony is made of intervals, and as such, it can be considered dissonant (scratchy, uncomfortable, like playing an E and an F at the same time) or consonant (pleasing or smooth). What makes a harmony pleasing or unpleasing, however, is extremely relative. In medieval times, only octaves and perfect fifths were considered harmonious, and any harmony that deviated from that was generally frowned upon. In modern western music, though, nearly everything is considered to be harmonious by someone. Fifths are still very popular in modern harmony but are now used in the most unlikely of places; heavy metal music, for example, frequently uses perfect fifths in the vocal harmony to create an eerie effect when layered on top of the more dissonant instrumentation.

Harmony, in addition to being consonant or dissonant, can also be subordinate or coordinate. Subordinate harmony, the tonal harmony used most frequently today, is a series of harmonies that are based on each other. The harmony moves in such a way that a resolution is somewhat predictable; you can hear this type of harmony in modern pop music, musical parts that flow very easily into each other and don’t leave the listener baffled as to the turn the song has taken. On the other hand, coordinate harmony is a series of harmonies that operate independently of each other. They do have some common relation, of course, but don’t typically move toward a goal, or predictable resolution. Renaissance musicians often used this type of harmony, and it’s capable of producing rich and moving textures within a piece of music.

Learning music theory and harmony is not just an option you can take or leave: it is part and parcel of the “stuff of music”. No surgeon would ever say “I don’t want to learn all that stuff about the nervous system & the skeletal system and blood vessels and how the lungs and heart works and all that stuff — I just want to operate”.

And yet the majority of piano players ignore the very thing that would take them to the next level in their playing and knowledge — music theory & harmony.

For more info on music theory & harmony please go to “Music Theory & Harmony: Boring? No! It’s An Exciting X-Ray Into How Music Works!” In addition, a series of 101 free email lessons on music theory & piano chords is available at “Music Theory & Piano Chords & Sizzling Chord Progressions!”

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Duane_Shinn

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An intoxicated Britney Spears was arrested and stretchered away from her home by ambulance early today after refusing to hand her children over to their father, Kevin Federline.

A four-hour standoff at the troubled singer’s Beverly Hills mansion began at 7pm (0300 GMT) when she refused to hand her sons, two-year-old Sean Preston and one-year-old Jayden James, over to her ex-husband, known as K-Fed.

Police officers arrived at Spears’ home at around 8pm. She finally turned over the children at around 10.50pm, according to the Los Angeles police department.

Spears was taken to the Cedars-Sinai medical center, where she has been visited by her father, Jamie, according to US entertainment websites.

Us magazine and the celebrity gossip website TMZ also claimed her younger son was taken to hospital at the same time in another ambulance.

The hospital has refused to comment, citing patient confidentiality laws.

Six police cars, a police helicopter and a fire truck were called to the incident.

Aerial footage from KTLA-TV showed Spears being lifted into an ambulance on a stretcher. She was taken to hospital to be tested for both drink and drugs.

The LAPD officer Jason Lee told the City News Service that Spears was under the influence of an unknown substance. He added that no one was injured.

The incident involved a family dispute that police worked to resolve “peacefully by court order”, he said.

Spears and Federline, who were married in October 2004 and divorced in July, are fighting over custody of their sons. Federline, 29, has temporary custody because Spears - who has limited visitation rights - has defied court orders.

The incident that led to police being called began when Spears refused to obey the court order and would not let the court-appointed monitor into her home.

She also refused to allow Federline’s two bodyguards into the house when they arrived to take the children just before 8pm.

Her soon to be former lawyer, Sorrell Trope, told Us magazine: “In a normal case when someone shows up with a certified court order saying kids need to be somewhere else, the police see to it that the order is obeyed. But that is in a normal case.”

Earlier yesterday, Spears arrived 90 minutes late for a deposition in her custody case at Federline’s lawyer’s office. She stayed for only a few minutes.

Today’s incident is the latest in a string of scandals to hit the troubled pop star.

Spears reportedly checked into rehab in February last year, checking out again within 24 hours.

The following night, she went to a Los Angeles hair salon and shaved her hair off with clippers, prompting psychologists to declare her “disturbed”.

In October, Spears was ordered to relinquish custody of her sons because the superior court commissioner said she was a “habitual, frequent and continuous use of controlled substances and alcohol”.

She was allowed to see her children only if a monitor was present, and the visits could be cut short if the monitor decided Spears’ behavior endangered the them.

The singer was also ordered to undergo random drug and alcohol testing twice a week.

A few days later, she was officially charged with misdemeanor hit-and-run and driving without a license, which was later dismissed.

After taking her case to the high court, the star won modified visitation rules that allow her two boys to spend one night a week with her.

Spears still faces a misdemeanor charge of allegedly driving without a valid license.

Technorati Tags: music,baby sleep too much

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Comfort Of Strangers is the latest Pop CD put out by the highly talented Beth Orton who once again has delivered a brilliant collection of tracks. I’m confident Beth Orton fans, and Pop fans alike will be pleased with this one.

I wish it weren,t the case but, it’s not everyday that I get a CD from an artist that I can just pop in and comfortably listen to from beginning to end. There is usually a song or two that I just can’t force myself to get through. Not at all the case with Comfort Of Strangers. Every track is enjoyable and was pretty easy for me to listen to from start to finish.

Comfort Of Strangers is a pleasantly varied, mix of 14 tracks that are very well written songs by this clearly outstanding artist. Most of the songs display a lot of the kind emotion that makes for a really great listen. Seemingly drawing from what I can only imagine are her own personal experiences. At different points touching on the most real emotions like love, heartbreak, pain, failed relationships and unattainable romance. They’re all here.

One of the refreshingly nice things about this CD is the way all of the participating artists seem to be really enjoying themselves. Combine that with the overall presentation and you’ve got one of Beth Orton’s most impressive releases ever.

This is a first rate CD, delivering a little something for everyone. I give it my highest recommendation. It’s quite simply great listening. A must buy if you’re even mildly into Pop music.

If you’re a Beth Orton fan this is a CD your collection flat cannot be without. In fact, this is one of those CDs that you don’t even have to be a fan of Orton, or even Pop to know is good. It’s just good music. Period.

While this entire album is really very good the truly standout tunes are track 3 - Heartland Truckstop, track 5 - Comfort Of Strangers, and track 10 - Safe In Your Arms.

My SmoothLee Bonus Pick, and the one that got Sore [...as in "Stuck On REpeat"] is track 6 - Shadow Of A Doubt. Outstanding!

Comfort Of Strangers Release Notes:

Beth Orton originally released Comfort Of Strangers on Feb 7, 2006 on the Astralwerks label.

CD Track List Follows:

1. Worms 2. Countenance 3. Heartland Truckstop 4. Rectify 5. Comfort Of Strangers 6. Shadow Of A Doubt 7. Conceived 8. Absinthe 9. A Place Aside 10. Safe In Your Arms 11. Shopping Trolley 12. Feral 13. Heart Of Soul 14. Pieces Of Sky

Personnel: Beth Orton; TJ Doherty, Tim B.. Recording information: Sear Sound Studio, New York, New York (2005).

Clyde Lee Dennis a life long music enthusiast, writes CD reviews and is also the Sports Editor at Baltimore.eNewsBriefs.com covering topics like the Baltimore Ravens and more. Visit Baltimore eNewsBriefs for the latest Baltimore News

This article is free for republishing
Source: http://www.articlealley.com/article_179640_48.html

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