Friday, October 5, 2007

Today’s Response
Middle Tennessee State University

Songs for Silas

Music lovers will benefit from great sounds and MTSU's budding songwriters will benefit from funds raised at a concert set for 8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 6, at the Bluesboro Rhythm & Blues Co. on the public square in Murfreesboro. The event, a benefit concert for the new Silas Rock Botner Memorial Scholarship at MTSU, honors a three-year-old Murfreesboro boy and budding drummer who drowned this past August. MTSU recording industry alumnus John Salaway, a bandmate of Silas' father, helped launch the scholarship, which will be awarded annually to a student in the university's new commercial songwriting program.

For more information about the scholarship or the benefit concert, call Dr. Tom Hutchison at 615-513-6278 or Hal Newman at 615-308-3437.

Sun-spinning

Marcin Bela, assistant professor of theory and composition at MTSU, will present a free and open faculty recital at 8 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 7, in the T. Earl Hinton Music Hall of the Wright Music Building. Joining Bela will be Randy Boen (electric guitar), Russell Wright (electric bass) and Curt Redding (drums). Boen, Wright and Redding are members of the local music project known as the Johnny Neel Criminal Element. Bela says the group will perform songs from his upcoming album titled One Spin of the Sun. Bela says his father, Zbigniew, wrote the book One Spin of the Sun between 1981 and 1982, when Bela was a small child and his father was an emerging writer in Poland. “The book is essentially a series of short observations of daily life occurrences with my 3-year-old self appearing in many chapters,” Bela says. “It offers an exceptionally honest insight into the logistics of life during the last decade of European Communism as it was collapsing before our eyes.”

Call 615-898-2493 or go to http://www.mtsumusic.com for more information.

Take me out to the fish fry.

The MTSU Blue Raider Baseball Grand Slam Fish Fry & Cajun Gumbo will be held Monday, Oct. 8, at the MTSU Tennessee Livestock Center. Proceeds will benefit MTSU Baseball. Enjoy country-fried whole catfish with all the trimmings and Cajun gumbo. Entertainment will be provided by the Russ & Becky Jeffers Country Band from Jack Daniels Distillery in Lynchburg. Last year, more than 600 pounds of catfish and 50 gallons of gumbo were prepared. Children under age 6 will get in free. Tickets are $15 in advance and $20 at the door and are available at the Middle Tennessee Ticket Office located at Gate 1A of Floyd Stadium and through the Blue Raider Athletic Association office.

Go to http://www.blueraiders.com. For group tickets in bundles of 10, call Baseball Coach Steve Peterson’s office directly at 615-898-2984 or send an e-mail to pfones@mtsu.edu.

TR EXTRA

BONJOUR!--Any student whose summer was no more exciting than spending endless hours lying by the pool frying to a crisp can prepare now for an unforgettable summer 2008. There’s no time like the present to register for the annual general education study abroad program in Cherbourg, France, which will run from June 2 to June 27. At this beautiful port town in the Normandy region of northwest France, students will experience the history, art and culture of the area. “With the general education program, a student can spend four weeks in Cherbourg and in Normandy, and they can begin studying French while they’re there if they choose to, but they don’t have to already know any French,” Dr. Anne Sloan, Assistant to the Provost for International Education, says. Contact Sloan at 615-898-5091 or asloan@mtsu.edu or Jennifer Campbell, Director of International Education and Exchange, at 615-898-5179 or jjcampbe@mtsu.edu.

COURAGE--MTSU Theatre will present its first outdoor theatrical experience with the classic drama “Mother Courage and Her Children” by Bertolt Brecht. The production will play at 7:30 p.m. tonight and tomorrow Oct. 5 and 6 on the south lawn of the Boutwell Dramatic Arts Building’s Tucker Theatre. The play’s storyline takes place amid a 30-year war in which Mother Courage, a canteen woman, continues to profit from the war. Her business is the war, and the wagon she pulls is her only possession. Her three children—Eilif, Swiss Cheese and Kattrin—have no father and no home. There is no charge for admission, and spaces are on a first-come, first-served basis starting at 7 p.m. prior to each performance. Donations are appreciated. For more information, please visit MTSU Theatre online at http://www.mtsu.edu/~theatre.

IT DON’T MEAN A THING IF IT AIN’T GOT THAT SWING--WMOT-FM’s annual membership appeal and on-air fundraising drive continues through Oct. 18. It will benefit MTSU’s nonprofit public broadcasting radio station. This year also marks the station’s 39th anniversary and its 25th year as an all-jazz formatted station. “Those who listen to and enjoy WMOT must support it financially,” says Keith Palmer, the station’s director of development. “Pledge so that radio in Middle Tennessee keeps swinging.” WMOT-FM is located on the radio dial at 89.5 and online at http://www.wmot.org. Contact Palmer at 615-898-2800 or kpalmer@mtsu.edu.

NO, NOT BEYONCE AND JAY-Z--“Double Stars” will be the topic of the upcoming First Friday Star Party from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. today, Oct. 5, in Room 102 of Wiser-Patten Science Hall at MTSU. Dr. Charles Higgins, physics and astronomy, will deliver a 30-45 minute lecture followed by outdoor telescope observation, weather permitting. The Star Party is free and open to the public. Contact Higgins at 615-898-5946 or chiggins@mtsu.edu.

PINK AND PURPLE POWER--The June Anderson Women’s Center at MTSU is distributing purple ribbons suitable for wearing in observance of Domestic Violence Awareness Month. “The numbers are alarming and the violence continues to spread across the United States,” says Terri Johnson, director of the Women’s Center. Since October also is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the center is making available pink ribbons to promote the need for early detection and more research. “Being a woman is the major risk factor for breast cancer,” Johnson says. “It is crucial to have early detection and screening to lower your risks.” For more information, contact the Women’s Center at 615-898-2193 or jawc@mtsu.edu.