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Grammys update: Local connects go 0 for 3

It comes as no surprise that our three locally connected Grammy contenders got shut out at tonight's 52nd annual Grammy Awards.

Ministry lost out to Judas Priest in the Best Metal Performance category.

Los Rieleros del Norte got clawed by Los Tigres del Norte (again) in the Best Norteno Album group.

And Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "It's Blitz!," recorded mostly at Tornillo's Sonic Ranch, didn't win the Best Alternative Music Album award. That went to France's Phoenix for their "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix" CD.

The usual rule of thumb is that most obvious names win in the so-called lesser categories, because the growing number of voters in the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, who hand out the awards, usually vote for names they know.

Ministry, whose founder Al Jourgensen has lived here since 2002, may be one of the fathers of industrial metal, but they don't have the name recognition of fellow contenders Megadeth, Slayer and Judas Priest, or the cache of newer band Lamb of God.

When it comes to norteno music, few acts are bigger, or better known, than Los Tigres.

I kind of thought the YYYs' album, which has gotten good reviews, might stand a chance in its category, but I figured the biggest name in the group, Depeche Mode, would win on name recognition alone. But the Phoenix album was a nice surprise, an acclaimed disc with a reputation that must have preceded the vote.

FYI: Country jammers the Zac Brown Band were the obvious choice for Best New Artist category, which they won. You can check out their "Chicken Fried" charm when they play the Pan Am Center on March 4.

Note to KDBC, which carried the show locally: Please, please, please carry it live next year. It sucks watching an awards show that's an hour old by the time it airs. You can follow the awards in real-time online and wait around for the performances, which are often overhyped and underwhelming on the show, but I prefer the real thing on TV — live.

Secondly, thanks to KDBC for accidentally airing the intro to "CSI: New York" at about 9:53, or about the time that Maxwell took the stage to sing "Pretty Wings." There's just no excuse for that kind of sloppiness on such a major awards show.

Megadeth update: Ticket price announced

Club 101's Joe Dorgan sez tix for the March 28 Megadeth show there will be $36. 

They go on sale Jan. 29 at Ticketbully. Hard tickets will be available at the club next week.

The group will celebrate the 20th anniversary of its "Rust in Peace" album by playing it from beginning to end on a month-long tour launching March 1.

Additionally, Testament will perform its debut album "The Legacy" in full on this tour, which also includes Exodus.

Megadeth and Testament were on the "American Carnage" tour, which was supposed to stop here Jan. 27, but was postponed before it ever started after bassist Tom Araya of co-headliner Slayer had to back out. He's have surgery on his neck this week.

The tour is being reset for the summer, with a late summer makeup date expected here.

Concert update: Zac Brown Band fries up a Pan Am show

Best New Artist Grammy nominees the Zac Brown Band will bring a little of their "Chicken Fried" Southern charm to NMSU's Pan Am Center at 7 p.m. March 4.

The band, which blends country and Southern rock, is coming off a strong 2009 in which it saw three singles including "Country Fried," go to No. 1 on the country charts, its debut album, "The Foundation," go platinum and a slew of awards and nominations, including three Grammy nods.

The band also started its own label, Southern Ground, and is in the process of launching a line of steak rubs and BBQ sauces as well as former restaurateur Brown's first cookbook.

Tickets for the show — which will include Southern Ground signees Nic Cowan, Levi Lowrey, Sonia Leigh and Joey + Rory, who'll MC — are $22 and $32, a limited number of which will be tickets for a GA floor near the stage.

They go on sale at 10 a.m. Jan. 29 at the box office, Ticketmaster outlets, ticketmaster.com and 800.745.3000.

Concert update: Megadeth at 101, Ripe Haiti benefit, Komen comedy tour

Megadeth fans bummed about the postponement of their Jan. 27 Coliseum show with Slayer won't have to wait too long for their heavy metal fix.

Dave Mustaine and company will bring their "Rust in Peace 20th Anniversary Tour" to Club 101 on March 28.

The band will perform its 1990 album "Rust in Peace" album in its entirety.

Additionally, openers Testament (also on the "American Carnage" bill with Megadeth and Slayer) will perform their debut album, "The Legacy," from start to finish. 

Also on the bill: Exodus.

I don't have much in the way of ticket info yet, though the fan club pre-sale is Jan. 28, with tickets going on sale to the public on Jan. 29.

• "For Haiti" is the name of a benefit running from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 5-9 p.m. Jan. 27 at Ripe Eatery and Market, 910 E. Redd. 

Mike Duncan will perform from 11 a.m.-1 p.m., followed by Julio Ortiz from 5-7 p.m. and Black Coyote from 7-9 p.m. 

There's no cover, but donations will go to Doctors Without Borders. The restaurant will donate all profits from food and non-alcohol sales to DWB.

Donate $150 or more and get a free entree and dessert.

• Brendan T. Gleason, Nick Hoff, Kevin Richards and Law Smith are headlining the nationwide "Pink Ribbon Comedy Tour," a fundraiser for Susan G. Komen for the Cure. The nearly four-month tour stops at the El Paso Comic Strip, 1201 Airway, at 6 p.m. Jan. 27.

Tickets are $13.65, on sale at the club or its Web site, laff2nite.com. 

The comedians (Richards' mom was diagnosed with breast cancer last year) is 30 percent of the retail sales price of each ticket sold to Komen. They're guaranteeing a minimum donation of $10,000 from the tour in support of breast cancer awareness. 

Their motto? "Laughter is the breast medicine."

EPSYOs clean up in Clorox contest

The El Paso Symphony Youth Orchestras finished third in the worldwide Facebook contest, good for a $10,000 grant from the bleach company and inclusion an advertisement in the April issue of People magazine.

The 223-member youth orchestra was one of five finalists that will receive the grants and national magazine exposure in the Clorox Clean-Up $10,000 Power a Bright Future contest.

The nonprofit organization received 14,305 votes in the contest, which was conducted on the Facebook social networking Web site, according to Mary Seltzer, a spokeswoman for the online contest, designed to help youth program "diminished by economic budget cuts."

"It's amazing how well we were able to pull support from all the different social networks and the people that we knew," EPSYOs General Manager Lesley Chen said, noting that the students, their parents and the board all banded together to get out the vote.

"It's a bright day for both the El Paso Symphony Youth Orchestras and our Clorox Clean-Up team — we are proud to be able to support such an important organization," Selin Alkan, Clorox's associate marketing manager, said in a press release.

Representatives from Clorox are expected to make a presentation during the group's next concert at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 6 at the Chavez Theatre, Chen said. Andres "Andy" Moran, the group's music director, will conduct.

Photos for the People magazine coverage may be taken that day, she added.

"We're headed to the gym already," Chen joked.

EPSYOs was one of 50 groups chosen to compete out of the 5,000 organizations that applied for the contest, according to  Seltzer. More than 133,000 votes were cast in the contest.

Clorox will post progress reports on the five finalists on its Clorox Clean-up Facebook page.

Concert review: Bailey's all-star performance

I wasn't sure going in why the El Paso Symphony Orchestra chose to call this past weekend's concerts at the Plaza Theatre as an "All-Star Celebration." 

Certainly, guest soloist Zuill Bailey is a star locally and a rising star in the classical music world. And I don't get the impression that guest conductor Alexander Platt is a particularly big name in his field, though he is the conductor of the Chicago Opera Theatre, a couple of smaller orchestras and music director of the Maverick Concerts series in Woodstock, NY, where he first met Bailey.

The weekend's program consisted of two works, one of which, Karl Goldmark's Rustic Wedding Symphony exists, in Platt's own words, on "the fringes" of classical repertoire. At Saturday's nearly sold-out performance, the second of two concerts, he noted "this may be the only time in your lives you'll hear this piece of music live."

So where does the "All-Star Celebration" tag come from? 

I thought maybe it had to do with the fact that Antonin Dvorak's Cello Concerto in B Minor was the star. It is, after all, one of the best known pieces of music in the classical world and, in Bailey's words, a "warhorse" of the repertoire, the classical music equivalent of what "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" is to the Rolling Stones' canon.

It all made sense to me in the second half of Saturday's program, when Bailey, who's kind of a rock star in his own musical world, performed the Dvorak concerto with Platt at the baton. 

He's a very theatrical performer, sometimes distractingly so (during those few moments, I found it best to close my eyes and just listen), but it doesn't take a classical music aficionado to recognize superior talent, technical prowess or the rarefied artistry to make an instrument truly sing.

Bailey has all that in spades. And, frankly, he kept the dramatics — the swinging bow, the flying hair, etc. — to a minimum Saturday. His was a focused, commanding performance of the sweetly sad piece, which was inspired by the impending death of the woman the composer loved, but never married.

Platt and Bailey took the unusual step of performing the Dvorak piece in the second half of the program. Usually, soloists play in the first half, the better to showcase the orchestra in the second. The first half was devoted to the Goldmark piece, a slow-building, slightly dull — at first — work that got more interesting as it gained momentum and the orchestra, parts of which struggled with it in the beginning, slowly rallied.

Conductor Platt, part of a guest conductor program started last year, has a very different style than Sarah Ioannides, the symphony's conductor and music director. Her movements are precise, commanding, often balletic. She manages to be graceful and forceful, often in the same motion. 

Platt has a more theatrical flair, lightly touching the air like he was pressing a button to activate a particular section, turning to the violins to encourage and bolster them with his left hand, and sometimes moving about the podium like he's about to jump off.

He often too long pauses to catch his breath and wipe away the sweat from his brow between movements of the Goldmark piece, which ended with a lot more intensity than it began. After the first movement of the 40-minute Dvorak piece, the Chicago-based Platt took a deep breath and dramatically grabbed the podium railing (he said after Saturday's "Opening Notes" pre-concert talk that he was still recovering from Friday's performance ... must be the elevation!). The crowd really seemed to like him by the end of the first half.

But all eyes were on Bailey in the second half. And he did not disappoint. I'm far from an expert in this field, but I recognize a technician when I see one. He's such a controlled player, just in terms of his command of the cello. In the pop music world, mediocre players often substitute dramatics to cover up their lack of ability. Not Bailey. His dramatic flair is a mere manifestation of the emotions he invests in his playing, and this particular concerto demands.

It is mostly sad and melancholic. Sweetly, soaringly so. The cello literally weeps at times. Bailey conveyed these feelings with both technical precision and a cerebral depth that was far more powerful and convincing than any theatrics.

Put in layman's terms, he made a 40-minute piece seem to fly by in half the time (when it was over, I wanted to hear more), and the orchestra, working with both a guest conductor and a well-known local soloist who helps run El Paso Pro-Musica, the local chamber organization, rose to the occasion.

By the time it was over Saturday night, it was obvious that the "all-star" theme really referred to the cumulative effect of a superior soloist, an engaging conductor who understood he was a guest not the boss and an orchestra that was up to the task.

Watching the Haiti benefit ... and being driven to tears

Up until now, the sheer magnitude of the death and destruction in Haiti has seemed so far away. I just haven't felt it. 

Maybe it's because I've been so damned busy for such a long stretch of time. The workload never seems to let up. If anything, it seems to get worse. 

For a guy who always has been interested in the world around him, there's been so little time to breathe it all in.

I wasn't even planning to watch tonight's "Hope for Haiti Now" telethon, which started at 6 p.m. on most of the cable networks available on Time Warner Cable, and on a tape-delayed basis on local network affiliates.

 I was going to see "It Could Get Loud," the recent documentary chronicling the meeting of guitar greats Jimmy Page, the Edge and Jack White, at UTEP tonight, the kick off of the winter half of UTEP's Cinema Novo series (it repeats at 7 p.m. Saturday at the UTEP Union Cinema).

But, alas, a stomach ache (and not this crappy weather) pre-empted that.

So around 6:30 I started watching on Discovery's HD channel, checking out John Legend's silky, subdued reading of "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child," a performance that really captured the tone of this classy, often emotional televised event (the performances of which will be available on iTunes).

Now I've watched things like this out of a sense of professional duty in the past. I was a fulltime pop music journalist for the better part of the last 20 years, until I moved back to El Paso and started working at the Times. 

I remember being riveted to the TV when a galaxy of music stars paraded out one after the other to pay tribute to the victims of 9/11 nearly nine years ago. Man, has it been that long.

This telethon — and I'm writing this at 7:30ish, while it's still going on — really reminds me an awful lot of that 9/11 one. The tone is solemn, the appeals are heartfelt and straightforward, not maudlin, and the real emotion comes through in the faces of the people who've been rescued and the images of those in despair, those who are dazed from their rescues and those who used their hands to dig through the rubble.

I'm a natural born skeptic when it comes to these kinds of things, usually because they try too hard to tug at the heartstrings and I'm not always confident the money is going where it's supposed to.

This telethon is a little more subtle, a little more graceful than that. 

The moment of connectivity for me was when the woman who had been trapped alive for six days called out to her husband, who never gave up hope, "Tell him live or die, I love him!"

My eyes flooded. Unexpectedly.

As someone who has found love again after many years without it, years spent resigned to spending the rest of my life alone, I know just how deep and resonant those words are.

I was on the phone in a matter of minutes, hoping to call in a modest pledge, hoping that the few dollars I can contribute will help pay for medical supplies or water or mechanical needs. The line, 877-99-HAITI, was busy, unfortunately, so I'll call again until I get through.

In the meantime, I will once again revel in music's incredible power to bring us all together. As I write this, I'm watching Bono sing with Rihanna as Jay-Z raps about trying "to make sense of this" and the Edge's guitar line snakes through the rhythm of a song called "Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour)."

There was Mary J. Blige's deeply soulful version of "Hard Times Come Again No More," backed, as all the New York-based performers have been, by the richly versatile The Roots, who also backed Sting's spirited version of "Driven to Tears."

Christina Aguilera once again showed just how powerful and emotive a voice she has on "If You Lift Me Up," and there have been some inspired collaborations, like Sheryl Crow, Kid Rock and Keith Urban doing "Lean on Me" and Neil Young and Dave Matthews wheezing out "Alone and Forsaken."

There really hasn't been a bad performance yet. Some have been better than others (I'm surprised at how pitchy Taylor Swift's voice sounds whenever I hear the 20-year-old sing live). 

The performances are sincere, the sentiments feel sincere and fully 10 days after disaster struck that perpetually down on its luck island nation, the tragedy — and the need — feel very real.

If you want to donate, you can call 877-99-HAITI, go to hopeforhaitinow.org or text 50555 ($10 will be added to your phone bill).

Concert update: Megadeth/Slayer due late summer?; Haiti benefit

A couple of sources close to the situation tell me that the local date of the  "American Carnage" tour, co-headlined by Megadeth and Slayer, should pass through town some time in the late summer or early fall.

The tour, which also was to feature Testament, was scheduled for Jan. 27 at the Coliseum, but was postponed when Slayer announced that bassist Tom Araya required surgery on his neck (not back, as originally announced).

He's having that procedure next week, according to a spokeswoman.

Britain's nme.com reports that Slayer's British tour dates have been moved back to May 26-June 3. They'll play a total of seven shows in jolly ol'.

Word is that the "Carnage" tour will start up this summer in North America, eventually making its way here near the end of the circuit, instead of near the beginning, as was going to be the case with the original show date.

In other concert news, El Paso ska-punkers Searchlight Needles are organizing a benefit show for Haitian relief. Called the "Help Haiti Benefit Show," it will be at 7 p.m. Jan. 29 at Badlands Billiards, 7792 Franklin.

Cover is $3, with all proceeds going to the local chapter of the American Red Cross for the organization's Haitian relief efforts.

Molly Mae Black, Improvision, Slap  Happy, In Line With You, From Past Intentions and Searchlight Needles will perform, according to the band's Robert L. Martinez.

Check 'em out at searchlight-needles.com or myspace.com/searchlightneedles.

Concert update: Tejano Legends, Coachella, Of Verona, Percolator showcase and more

The popular Tejano Legends concert series returns for the sixth installment on March 13, but at a new location — the Coliseum.

Little Joe y La Familia will headline a bill also featuring Raulito Navaria (Emilio's brother) and El Paso's Chuy Flores and Rhapsody.

Fans of the series are aware that the first four concerts, all sellouts, were held at the Plaza Theatre, which seats 2,000 people.

Promoter Ramiro "Ram" Guzman moved the series to the more spacious Coliseum on New Year's Eve, noting that fans wanted to have a dance floor instead of trying to wiggle their behinds in the relatively tight confines of the Plaza's permanent seating.

"We have had a lot of request(s) for dancing to this very lively music and we are trying to satisfy our patron request," Guzman said in a release announcing the next show.

He used a theater-like configuration for the New Year's Eve show, which limited seating but also allowed for the introduction of table seating, a potentially more profitable move.

"We had few problems but have addressed them and now (are) ready for a bigger show," he stated in the release. "While the coliseum is (a) big arena, we do not use all of it for this type of show."

Tickets are $20 and up, with tables that seat six people, going for $300. They go on sale Jan. 22 at Ticketmaster outlets, ticketmaster.com and 800.745.3000. 

No show time has been announced.

A portion of the proceeds will go to Sin Fronteras Organizing Projects, which works with farm workers along the border.

• Speaking of big spaces, check out who's coming to this year's Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival -- Jay-Z, Muse, Gorillaz and Thom Yorke, rare appearances by Public Image Ltd., Pavement, Faith No More and Sly and the Family Stone, and buzz bands such as The xx, Florence and the Machine and Passion Pit.

It's April 16-18 at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, Calif.

Tickets go on sale at 10 a.m. Jan. 22. A $200 daily ticket includes a tent, two sleeping bags, blankets and pillows. A three-day pass is $269. They'll be available at all Ticketmaster outlets, ticketmaster.com and coachella.com.

• Of Verona, Mandi Perkins' band, will play the Garage Tequila Bar, 4025 N. Mesa, at 9 p.m. Jan. 30. It's a 21-and-older show. There's no cover. It's being presented by EP's Two Ton Live.

• The Percolator, 217 N. Stanton, is hosting a Singer Songwriter Showcase at 8 p.m. Jan. 22. It will feature an impressive lineup of seriously talented local artists — Lusitania's Mike Duncan, the Royalty's Nicole Smith, Highway 28's Neno Cooper, Sleepercar's Clint Myers, Westbound Outlaw's Marco G. and Alabama Deathwalk's Eric Reed.

It's an all-ages show. Cover is $4.

• An organizational meeting for the second annual Chamizal Blues & Jazz Festival will be from 5:30-7:30 p.m. Jan. 27 at Ruli's International Kitchen. 

Also on the agenda: "the possible reintroduction of the Border Folk Festival," according to Jim Murphy, president of Los Paisanos de El Chamizal, the Chamizal National Monument's nonprofit support group, which staged the first blues and jazz festival last year. 

Border Folk was an institution around here at one time, bringing together diverse ethnic and folk musics from around the country and Mexico. Would be nice to see it's return. It's time.

Info: Elias Lopez, 603.8999.

• Jimmie Van Zant (yes, there is another Van Zant brother) will play "The Big Game — Super Sunday Party" on Super Bowl Sunday Feb. 7 at the Inn of the Mountain Gods in Mescalero, NM. Tickets for the show and tailgate party are $25 at the door. Go to innofthemountaingods.com for more info.

• Sarah Ioannides passed along a rave review she got from the Chattanooga Times Free Press for her performances last weekend with that city's symphony. She was a last-minute substitution for another guest conductor, Alondra de la Parra, who fell ill. 

"Maestro Ioannides was the ruler of her orchestral domain, eliciting the most sensitive playing," reviewer Mel R. Wilholt wrote. "The tight ensemble was the most impressive in a work that easily could become fragmented without a sure hand at the musical helm."

The El Paso Symphony Orchestra's conductor is expecting twins in April or May. She isn't leading the local orchestra's concerts with cellist Zuill Bailey at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 22-23 at the Plaza Theatre, a cooperative arrangement with Bailey's El Paso Pro-Musica. Guest conductor Alexander Platt will do that as part of the regular season schedule.

Sarah will be back on the podium for EPSO's "The Planets" multi-media concerts Feb. 26-27 at the Plaza Theatre.

• The Adobe Horseshoe Dinner Theatre in San Elizario will open for performances of A.R. Gurney's "Love Letters," directed by Jan H. Wolfe, on Feb. 13-14, according to Wolfe and San Eli artist and impresario Al Borrego. Mary Jane Windle and Pat Haggerty star. More details when I get 'em.

• The fifth installment of the PechaKucha nights, where artists and creative types meet and show off their latest projects, will be at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 19 at Forum Arts + Culture's new home, 1500 Texas (second floor). Organizers are looking for people interested in presenting their work. Go to pechakucha-ep.com.

• El Paso experimental rockers Zechs Marquise will open for RX Bandits and The Builders and the Butchers Feb. 20-March 1 in Australia and March 9-April 23 in North America.

There are no local shows on the itinerary, but the tour opens March 9 in Tempe at the Marquee Theatre, followed by a March 10 show at Tucson's Club Congress, March 12 at the Granada in Dallas, March 13 at the White Rabbit in San Antonio and March 14 at Emo's in Austin. 

Check 'em out at myspace.com/zechsmarquise.

• Local folk legends Applejack will play a dinner show at 8 p.m. Feb. 6 at La Tierra Cafe, 1731 Montana (home of some pretty good grub, btw). Cost is $30, which includes the meal. Details: 592.5122.

Carol Roberts-Spence leaving UTEP

Carol Roberts-Spence is leaving UTEP for UTPB.

Roberts-Spence, the gregarious redhead who runs UTEP's Special Events department, is taking a job at the University of Texas of the Permian Basin in Odessa, where she'll run a new, "state-of-the-art" performing arts center due to open in 2011.

She'll start there March 1. Her last day at UTEP will be around Feb. 19, she said.

“I get to build a performing arts center from the ground up,” she said of the $65 million, 1,800-seat theater, a cooperative venture between the cities of Midland and Odessa and UTPB.

A lot of people in her business "would die" for the chance to do that, she said.

“I’ve been here 20 years,” she said. “I think I’ve contributed to this university and the community for live entertainment. It’s an opportunity. ... Change is good, if you can affect it for your benefit.”

Roberts-Spence helped create UTEP's Special Events office in 1998. A 1990 UTEP grad, she's worked in events programming there since 1989.

During her lengthy tenure, the former Shakespearean actress helped bring major names such as the Rolling Stones, ‘N Sync, Shakira, George Strait and AC/DC to UTEP’s Sun Bowl and Don Haskins Center.

The UTPB theater will open in October 2011, with a grand opening planned for 2012.