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Fats Domino’s Katrina-damaged Grand Piano Finally Restored

By goodblacknews on May 4, 2013
A photo of musician Fats Domino lies in the street next to his home in the heavily damaged Lower Ninth Ward December 24, 2005 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Nearly four months after Hurricane Katrina devastated the area, the worst-hit parts of New Orleans and surrounding areas are still uninhabitable. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
A photo of musician Fats Domino lies in the street next to his home in the heavily damaged Lower Ninth Ward December 24, 2005 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Nearly four months after Hurricane Katrina devastated the area, the worst-hit parts of New Orleans and surrounding areas are still uninhabitable. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A white Steinway grand piano salvaged from musician Fats Domino’s home after Hurricane Katrina has been restored and will be the centerpiece of an exhibit in New Orleans’ French Quarter.  The piano was damaged after water poured through a broken levee during the August 2005 storm, flooding Domino’s home in the Lower 9th Ward.  Its restoration came through $30,000 donated to the Louisiana Museum Foundation.  
The largest gift of $18,000 came from Allan Slaight, a retired music producer in Miami. Other donations came from Sir Paul McCartney, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the Tipitina’s Foundation. The piano was to be unveiled Thursday at the Old U.S. Mint, now a museum in the French Quarter.  It will be part of the Louisiana State Museum’s music exhibition opening in 2014 but separately will go on display at the Mint in June.  A second Steinway piano belonging to Domino is on permanent display at the Presbytere Museum in the exhibition “Living with Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond.”
“Fats Domino is a seminal figure in American music, and he will have a prominent place in the coming Louisiana music exhibit,” said Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne, who oversees the Louisiana State Museum. “His beautiful grand piano, fully restored, will serve as the perfect symbol for Louisiana’s resilient nature and ever-evolving musical heritage.”
Born in New Orleans in 1928, the pianist, singer and songwriter sold more than 65 million records between 1950 and 1963, made Billboard’s pop chart 77 times and its rhythm and blues chart 61 times.  Katrina tore into Louisiana and Mississippi on Aug. 29, 2005. Flooding from storm surge and broken levees washed over an estimated 80 percent of New Orleans.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press; article by Stacey Plaisance via thegrio.com

Homeless Teen Drew Gooch Earns Full Scholarship To College in Tennessee

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013

Drew Gooch, 17, is homeless student that is graduating at the top of his class and a full ride to Middle Tennessee State University.
Drew Gooch, 17, is a homeless student who is graduating at the top of his class and earning a full ride to Middle Tennessee State University.
There are plenty of students that have problems to contend with at home that no one knows about. These brave soldiers still get up every morning and go to school to get some relief from their situation and try hard to focus.
Drew Gooch is a high school senior that was living in his 1997 Toyota Camry because his mother’s live-in boyfriend is a registered sex offender which prevented him from legally living with her. He has had an uphill struggle to survive, but managed to earn a full scholarship to Middle Tennessee State University, along with the Bootstrap Scholarship, a scholarship for “hardworking students who overcame odds to excel in their classes,” as well as a Martin Luther King Jr. scholarship.
He doesn’t mention much about his mom in his story, but talks about how he has taken care of himself buying his own groceries and washing his clothes and simply fending for himself, according to the Daily News Journal.  He told Nashville’s News 2 how he had been taking care of himself for as long as he can remember.  It wasn’t the first time Gooch was alone, though…he remembers being ages six and seven, and not having anyone around to do things like make meals.  ”I’ve always taken care of myself,” he said.”
To survive, he would stay with an older sister or friends, he’d stay in the library until it closed, slept in his car behind Embassy Suites, and provided a donut to teachers that would agree to work with him on his studies a half an hour before school started at Holloway High School.  The 17-year-old is obviously mature beyond his years and his principal believes he’s a godsend:
“Drew is every teacher and every principal’s dream,” said Holloway High School principal Sumatra Drayton. “I know Drew will be back here, speaking at graduation. Drew will be back here mentoring students and being a model.”  Gooch has a job at McDonald’s and he is the valedictorian of his graduating class with a 3.9 GPA.  This is a story of perseverance and dedication to education that every child should read.  Gooch wants other students to know:  “Take what life gives you. Don’t give up. Don’t sell yourself short. The only person who can decide who you can be is you,” Gooch said. “That’s what I tell myself when I look in the mirror every morning.”  To see video of Drew and his story, click here.
article via eurthisnthat.com

First Official Photo from TLC Biopic Released

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013

(L-R) Drew Sidora, Keke Palmer and Lil Mama in VH1's "Crazy Sexy Cool: The TLC Story"
(L-R) Drew Sidora, Keke Palmer and Lil Mama in VH1′s “Crazy Sexy Cool: The TLC Story”

No, that’s not Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins, Rozonda “Chilli” Thomas and Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes as TLC circa 1992.
It’s Drew Sidora as T-Boz, Keke Palmer as Chilli, and Lil’ Mama as Left Eye in VH1’s upcoming TV movie about the 90s r&b/hip hop trio.
VH1 released this photo today as an official first photo from the upcoming biopic “Crazy Sexy Cool: The TLC Story.”
“Drumline’s” Charles Stone III is directing from a screenplay by “What’s Love Got To Do With It’s” Kate Lanier.
The real T-Boz, Left Eye and Chilli from TLC (1992)
The real T-Boz, Left Eye and Chilli from TLC (1992)

The film started production in March in Atlanta where Chilli, Left Eye and T-Boz started their rise to multi-platinum fame as one of the most successful musical trios of all time.
The two surviving members of the group, Chilli and T-Boz, serve as consultants and executive producers on the movie. The pic is scheduled to premiere toward the end of the year.
article via eurweb.com

Born On This Day in 1921: Boxing Legend Sugar Ray Robinson

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013
Sugar Ray Robinson
 Born Walker Smith Jr. on May 3, 1921 in Ailey, Georgia, boxing legend Sugar Ray Robinson is often regarded as the greatest boxer in history. Robinson began his boxing career at 19 after moving to New York City with his family as a teenager. Using the borrowed Amateur Athletic Union boxing card of a friend named Ray Robinson, he began to practice regularly at a Harlem gym where his talent was recognized. Robinson earned the moniker “Sugar” from his coach George Gainford, who characterized the boxer’s style as being “sweet as sugar.”  In just six years, he became the world welterweight champion, boasting an 91 fight winning-streak. He held the title from 1946 to 1951. At the height of his career, Robinson’s record was 128-1-2 with 84 knockouts.  To learn more about Robinson’s life and career, click here and watch video footage of Robinson below:
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VLWBVpL23k&w=560&h=315]
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson

Mo’Nique Talks to Spelman Students About Healthy Living

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013
(Photo: Derrick Salters/WENN.com)
This week, Academy Award-winning actress Mo’Nique took the stage with other dynamic women to talk to Spelman College’s students about obesity and its health-related issues. The event, “The Best Advice I Ever Got: Conversations With Wise Women,” is part of Spelman’s push to better the health of its Black women on campus.
Mo’Nique talked about how for years she embraced her large size, believing it was an act of resistance against a culture that tells women that skinnier is better and fat shames those who don’t fit into that mold. She also talked about how Black women are encouraged to be thick in our community.  But on stage, she told the crowd that her husband made her realize the reality — she weighed too much. The Washington Post wrote:
When her husband asked her weight, she told him, “proudly, as sexy as I could, ‘262 pounds.’ ”  When her husband responded, “That’s too much,” Mo’Nique was dumbstruck. Until he added, “I want you for a lifetime.”
No loved one had ever told her, “That’s too much weight.” Deeply moved, Mo’Nique reflected on all she secretly carried that was “too much”: too much depression, too much anger, too much shifting the “poison” of her rage onto others. Her “best advice” to Spelman students: Shush the “fraudulent” inner voice that suggests you settle for less. “Will yourself to win.”
Since that day, Mo’Nique embarked on a fitness journey and lost a total of 70 pounds with the help of regular workouts with her trainer, cutting out junk food and eating healthier. And these are exactly the types of messages that Spelman wants for its students to hear.

Kevin Krigger Aims to End 102-Year Winless Streak for African-Americans in Kentucky Derby

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013

Kevin Krigger
Jockey Kevin Krigger

Kevin Krigger’s first-ever mount, as the legend is told, came at the tender age of five when he surreptitiously bolted from a backdoor in his family’s home in St. Croix, bounded onto a horse owned by one of his neighbors and took off down the street.
It didn’t take long for Krigger, the jockey of Santa Anita Derby winner Goldencents, to teach himself at a young age to mount a bareback horse by jumping off the roof of his parents’ car. Near his 10th birthday, Krigger’s grandmother bought him his first horse, a foal he used to win nearly 100 match races against his rivals in their mid-to-late teens on the sandy beaches of the U.S. Virgin Islands.
By then, the headstrong rider already had a singular goal cemented in his mind: It was “not I’m going to be the first African-American to win the Kentucky Derby in 100-something years. It was just, ‘I’m going to win the Kentucky Derby,” Krigger told reporters this week.
On Saturday, Krigger can make history by becoming the first African-American to win the Run for the Roses since Jimmy Winkfield captured the historic race in consecutive years in 1901 and 1902. Krigger, 29, is the first African-American jockey to ride in the Kentucky Derby since 2000 and just the third to be entered in the first leg of the Triple Crown since 1920. As Krigger has prepared the son of Into Mischief for the 139th renewal of the Derby this week, he has taped a photo of Winkfield to his locker at Churchill Downs for motivation.
“The look in his eyes,” Krigger told the Associated Press, “was telling me, ‘You’re going to do it.'”
In 1903, Winkfield nearly became the first and only jockey to win the Derby in three consecutive years, when his fortunes turned. While the young jockey reportedly became blacklisted for failing to honor a riding contract with an owner, mounts for African-American riders increasingly leveled off as Jim Crow laws proliferated in the segregated south.

LeBron James Wins 4th NBA MVP Award

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013
LeBron James #6 of the Miami Heat celebrates a basket against the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden on March 3, 2013 (Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)
James #6 of the Miami Heat celebrates a basket against the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden on March 3, 2013 (Photo by Nick Laham/Getty Images)

LeBron James is getting his fourth Most Valuable Player award — and the only mystery left is whether the vote was unanimous.  The Miami Heat star will be introduced Sunday as the award winner, according to a person familiar with the results and who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the league has not publicly announced the result. James will become the fifth player with at least four MVP awards, joining Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Michael Jordan, Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain.

No one has ever swept every first-place vote in the NBA’s MVP balloting. After the season he had, James could be the first.  “I don’t know who else you’d vote for,” Heat forward Chris Bosh said Friday. “No offense to everybody else, but that’s just how good he has played this year.”
James averaged 26.8 points, 8.0 rebounds and 7.3 assists this season, shooting a career-best 56 percent. It was absolutely no surprise that he won the award, and given the timetable for Miami’s next game — the Heat don’t open Eastern Conference semifinal play until Monday night against Brooklyn or Chicago — it had been widely assumed for several days that Sunday would be the day.

'Africa's Next Top Model': Tyra Banks Expands Her ANTM Empire To Africa

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013

africas next top model
According to Huff Post Black Voices, Tyra Banks is expanding “Top Model” empire by producing “Africa’s Next Top Model” this fall.  Africa is now the fourth continent to adopt ANTM’s highly successful model search-meets-reality show concept.  Banks has tapped Nigerian model Oluchi Onweagba Orlandi (pictured above) to serve as the series’ host and co-producer.
“The African version of the franchise is long overdue and I expect the show to be a smashing success across the continent,” Oluchi said in a release.  Twelve young women will be chosen from eight countries throughout Africa, and, like the U.S. version, the model hopefuls will compete in a number of photo shoots and challenges over the course of ten episodes to see who makes it to the top.  No judges have been announced yet, but production will begin in August in Cape Town, South Africa.
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson and Lesa Lakin

Jay-Z Joins Pitch to Redevelop Nassau Coliseum

By goodblacknews on May 3, 2013

Jay-Z attends the 'The Great Gatsby' world premiere at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts on May 1, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images)
Jay-Z attends the ‘The Great Gatsby’ world premiere at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts on May 1, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images)

NBC New York – Jay-Z is part of a group trying to renovate Nassau Coliseum.  The music mogul attended a meeting Thursday on Long Island, where the media was briefed on four proposals to renovate the arena and surrounding property.  Nassau County officials have been trying to come up with a plan to redevelop the 40-year-old arena for many years.  Its primary tenant, the New York Islanders hockey team, is moving to the new arena in Brooklyn when its lease expires in 2015.  Jay-Z’s Roc Nation is part of a group that built Barclays Arena and is bidding for the Long Island project.

Click here to read more.
article via thegrio.com

AOL Originals Lines Up Anthony Anderson, Nicole Richie and More for Web Series

By goodblacknews on May 2, 2013
Screen Shot 2013-05-02 at 1.00.33 AM
Anthony Anderson in AOL Originals series “Anthony Eats America”

Adweek reports that Web portal AOL has 15 original projects slated to debut this fall, as it attempts to get advertisers to consider its original shows up against networks such as ABC and Fox. Among the shows in the works are Anthony Eats America, a food-centric travelogue starring comedian Anthony Anderson, Candidly Nicole, a series built around Nicole Richie’s Twitter account (#candidlynicole), along with Funded, a show that looks at crowdfunding business success stories hosted by  author, entrepreneur and comedian Baratunde Thurston, and My Ink, a documentary focused on the back stories on sports stars tattoos.

Nicole Richie“The main thing is AOL is positioned to bridge the gap between Web and TV,” Ran Harnevo, Senior Vice President of AOL Video, told Adweek. “We think we can show there is no substantial difference between the two media when it comes to quality and measurement.”