Roanoke Local Colors Celebrates its 19th Year!!

This past May 16th, we once again witnessed the amazing Local Colors Festival at Elmwood Park in beautiful Downtown Roanoke, VA. Led by Founder and Executive Director of Local Colors, Pearl Fu, this annual festival is an internationally recognized cultural event. It is also one of the largest and most anticipated events held in Roanoke.

Pearl began Local Colors 19 years ago and it has grown from four participants in the parade to 89 countries this year. The opening ceremony, before the Parade of Nations, saw each country's members lining up all around the amphitheatre area and winding around the park in vibrant hues of their representative nations' customary and traditional garb, carrying the flags of their native or ancestral lands - a glorious sight to see and acknowledge that people the world over feel priviledged to make a new life here in the greatest land on earth and still can be proud of their heritage as well.

Ms Fu explains on its organization's website, "Local Colors highlights the ethnic and cultural diversity of the Roanoke Valley. It has opened the minds and hearts of many, enriching the quality of life for all who have been part of it."

The annual Local Colors has been documented as a Local Legacy and awarded an Outstanding Event in Southwest Virginia by the Library of Congress. It draws crowds of up to 30,000 - which is an amazing feat for a one day festival - and it is easy to see why. Under the directorship of Ms Fu, this event is spectacular! She personally "enlists" new entries continually throughout the year (and I feel obliged now to consider joining too as a representative of Hungary).

There were many world dancers, singers, and musicians on stage after the Parade of Nations. This year, Local Colors incorporated an International Fashion Show to the repertoire. Visitors were entertained for six hours as well as educated in facts of each nation's backgrounds while the weather cooperated as if out of respect for such an enormously important day to Roanokers and fans from all over.

Star City FAME ran footage of much of the day's celebration and thank Ms Fu for granting camera access to the Local Colors Festival. Below is a short video collage of the Parade of Nations and we will bring you more highlights of this beautiful event shortly, so stay tuned!!

See you around Roanoke!!

Festival in the Park - Memorial Day Weekend

First, Happy Memorial Day to you all!! Thank you U.S. Veterans everywhere - and you are everywhere on this planet keeping us safe here at home. Thank you for your past and present sacrifices, which are heroic and successful efforts - always!

This weekend in Roanoke, EventZone is bringing us its 40th Festival in the Park to celebrate Memorial Day with a BANG!! We have been so fortunate not to have the rain that was expected the whole weekend, and the festivities are continuing without being rained out. (Hopefully, we'll be spared today too!)

The good people at EventZone graciously allowed me at Star City FAME and Hans Moore of AhhaPictures to run around Elmwood Park and film some of Saturday night's highlights of the festival. Many thanks to Debbie McClure and Larry Landolt, VP and Executive Director respectively on the EventZone Board of Directors, for giving us permission to run footage. We will be presenting the video here and on YouTube as fast as we can edit it... so stay tuned for that!!

ALSO - EventZone is always looking for volunteers to help with their many events and festivals throughout the calendar year. The people of Roanoke have so many opportunities to be of service to our wonderful city. By assisting with EventZone functions, they are strengthening Roanoke's desirable offerings to visitors and area dwellers alike. Plus, it is hands-down the most fun you can have while volunteering!!

So far, this weekend has brought us acts from around the nation and locally. Beginning on Thursday, May 21st, Cox and Q99 sponsored 12 O'Clock Knob, the Jordan Harmon Band, and tribute band Bruce in the USA. WDBJ7 and Star Country presented Grant Randolph and the Allstar Band, Jamie O'Neal, and Jason Michael Carroll on Friday. Saturday's show, which Hans and I attended and shot video (for all you folks!!), featured Blues Agents, Az Izz, and Dickey Betts and Great Southern, sponsored by Bud Light and WROV.

Last evening, I volunteered at the stage for a super terrific show, sponsored by radio station Star Country 94.9FM. It was "Unplugged" and very personal! Trent Tomlinson opened the show, followed by the fabulous Heidi Newfield, and closed with Jimmy Wayne.

(Trent Tomlinson - Image courtesy Katiedid at wikipedia.org)(Heidi Newfield - Image by Brian Tipton, courtesy comt.com)(Jimmy Wayne - Image by Brian Tipton, courtesy cmt.com)

Roanoke is always pleased to be visited by wonderful artists - and I'd like to thank them all for bringing their tour through our fine Valley, as we are particularly supportive of the Arts here in Roanoke.

Tonight, to close the Festival's Memorial Day weekend shows, Kroger, Oakey's, and Q99 will sponsor local studio (and now performing) act Aamen, Anders and Brown, and 1964: The Tribute. Hope you can make it to the Park!!

... see you around Roanoke!!

David Simpkins and Friends at the Earth Day Festival

David Simpkins is a Roanoke & New River Valley Singer-Songwriter, seen here with fellow local artists Greg Trafidlo (guitar/ vocals) and Britt Mistele (vocals). Together they played at this year's Earth Day celebration in the historical Grandin Village area of Roanoke, VA.

When we left the Heart of Virginia's grand opening over at Grandin Gardens just a few minutes before, I was heading up to Memorial Ave. As I pulled up to the traffic light, I noticed David and Friends playing on the corner at the mini amphi-theatre. I just had to park the car and grab the Star City FAME video camera for this one, folks!!

Anyone who's seen David's set around Roanoke or the New River Valley knows that he writes some of the best Americana folk music going. He's a pro performer whether he's playing solo or backed by the area's most talented singers and players. The guy rocks. (I must warn you that it's highly likely you will be humming his tunes long after hearing him play. For best results, though, take a CD or two home so that you get it right each time.)

David has been interviewed for podcast by the Roanoke Times and often talked about favorably in the press. His music is broadcast in mediums from commercial to public to internet radio stations. You can pick up a copy of David's CD Long Story Short from CD Baby or download the mp3 version from there as well. Please visit David's website for more info on his life and music, upcoming gigs, and booking contact.

David Simpkins will be appearing at Third Street Coffeehouse next Friday as one of the "Songwriters in the Round" performers on May 29th, 2009, in Roanoke, VA. This special performance is given annually by the Southwest Virginia Songwriters' Association. David is the SVSA's President this year. Britt Mistele is currently its Vice-President, and Greg Trafidlo is its Treasurer.

Enjoy the video! See you around Roanoke!!!

At The Heart of Virginia Foundation, Every Day is an Earth Day

When we asked founders Nancy Hunter and Tommy Edwards if they wouldn't mind us coming to find out about the Heart of Virginia Foundation, we didn't expect to have this much fun over a really serious cause. Although we shot this short interview on Earth Day, the fact that the Heart of VA's new Center for Integrated Arts is housed at Grandin Gardens and offers programs which involves its participants in art, poetry and music makes every day an "earth day" experience.

Their Mission and Campaign page of their website explains it best, "The mission of the Center for Integrated Arts is to advance public awareness and increase opportunities for our community to experience the wellness and healing benefits of expressive arts and therapies. Group and Individual Programs will be person-centered and accommodate special needs. The center may incorporate and integrate existing programs and organizations that are in alignment with or mission, as well as, offer new programs that will allow for organic growth a greater understanding of sustainable living in the 21st century and beyond. Opportunities will include, art and music therapies, fine arts education and instruction, performing arts, media arts, healing arts, physical arts, meditative arts, drama, dance, live performances, exhibits, support groups, mentoring programs and various other community activities."

Please visit The Heart of Virginia Foundation's website for more information, whether it be for you, someone you know, or to find out how you can be of valuable help to your friends and neighbors. And it is a neighborhood, a community, and a piece of the global village - back in my time (oh, at least a century ago) we called it "a small world."

What the Heart of VA does, however, is in no way small. It is nothing short HUGE, as is Tommy and Nancy's heart and dedication to their movement in providing a key answer to the stigma of mental illness through their concerted efforts and the fruits of its highly needed volunteerism.

PS: The band that is playing in the background and on camera at the Grandin Gardens in this footage is called The Flying Rugs. Please check them out on My Space by clicking on their name above. Their music is Americana-Folk Rock and we were delighted to have their wonderful talent included in the video!!

Earthquake Roanoke-Style

Hi Y'all! This graphic to the left is courtesy of WSLS of Roanoke, VA. I don't think we had much of anything over which to take a picture or a video of regarding this morning's earthquake - Thank Heavens!!!

However, the US Geological Survey has upped our inital level from a 2.6 magnitude to a 3.0 magnitude earthquake. (I did not feel anything this morning, but that may be due either to working in Entertainment - which means late nights and passing out dead - or to living out in North County, close to Botetourt... I dunno).

In the WSLS report today, Dr. Martin Chapman at the seismological observatory at Virginia Tech stated, “A magnitude three earthquake like we had today would be about a thousand times bigger than a magnitude zero earthquake."

Indeed, that is cause for excitement, both scary and otherwise, if you were awake to have felt it. I lived in Central New Jersey all my life before coming here in 2005, and experienced only one such small earthquake (for which I had been awake). The bed shook, as I recall. It also sounded like a distant rumble of thunder yet you knew it was very nearby as it permeated the darkness of night and did not have the distinct echo of actual far-away thunder. It could be felt through the membranes of your very marrow. Spooky...

I did notice something unusual last night, though. My house is not prone to settling, yet every so often, there were creeks and pops a little around the time before the hour of this quake, which is officially stated to have happened at 4am. I was awake up until about 3am. (Sort of awake, reading a book after a long day of editing and mixing a local songwriter's live CD.)

Well, let's all be glad this wasn't anything more dramatic than something to talk about today. In fact, I had no idea until Ms. Pearl Fu of Local Colors mentioned it on stage at this year's Annual Local Colors event at Elmwood Park in Downtown Roanoke this morning.

By the way, we went out to shoot footage of Local Colors. We'll bring you the video and a blog post on it early this next week. (I ran 3 hours of tape very easily. There was SOOOO much cool stuff that went on, I just couldn't shut the camera off!!)

Hopefully, this quake isn't a pre-shock and will remain a one-off for now. The bigger quake today was definitely the Local Colors festivities!!