Walking Man Live

Long Island Gay And Lesbian Youth (LIGALY) has announced plans for the 17th annual gay pride parade through Huntington Village and Heckscher Park. In addition to the annual parade through Main St, event organizers will be having a festival in Heckscher Park featuring food courts, live music, and kids (and adults) activities such as face painting, cotton candy, balloon animals, and a moon bouncer at 1:30pm until 6pm on June 10th.
The live entertainment will be preformed by France Joli, disco-era super star with the hit single, “Come To Me”. She will be joined by Jordan Sparks, one of American Idol’s top 24 contestants this season. Also keep a look out for LIGALY Pride Dancers who will probably be dancing along to the tunes of the, soon to be announced, Out Idol competition winner.

Idol Out is an American Idol like competition for gay and lesbian teens in Long Island who have a talent for singing. Currently there are 3 finalists left, but only 1 winner will be announced on June 1st. That singer will then preform at the LIGALY prom on June 8th, and again for the festival on June 10th.

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A common complaint about Long Island is its lack of a nightlife involving live music. There aren’t too many music-only venues in Long Island. Sure you can check out a bar in Huntington Village and see the one guy playing acoustic guitar, or look around as no one dances to the repetitive old music from a “DJ”, but thats not a true live music experience. Lately the trend has been for bars to hire a few musicians and then advertise live music to get people in the bars. Fortunately for the bartenders, it works, unfortunately for the music scene, its suicide.

Seeing the same band every week, with the same crowd, in the same bar stool will drive a person insane. It weakens the audience and discourages the bands. Long Island, although lacking a bit, does have a few places where the average person can go and enjoy music. You can discover a new band, make new friends, and have the time of your life in some of the best venues on the Island. Here’s a few that I have enjoyed attending: (more…)

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The Jones Beach 2007 Summer Concert Schedule is out with over 20 shows to help us all get through this summer. The Nikon at Jones Beach Theater, formerly known as the Tommy Hilfiger at Jones Beach Theater, has a seating capacity for 15,200 people, and is located on Jones Beach State Park, on the southern shore of Long Island, NY.

This summer’s calendar includes big name musicians such as Rush, Meatloaf, Incubus, and more.

Full Schedule: (more…)

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How much is music worth to you? Will you buy a 9-song CD for $25? Is Barbara Streisand really worth $1,000 to see live? Will an autographed sock for $4,000 really bring you closer to the musician?

Unfortunately, for those of us who ask this question, the answer is probably no, we can’t afford that.

But a few Long Islanders will have the opportunity to see 5 great musicians for the amazing price of $15,000. The admission includes Prince, Billy Joel, Dave Matthews, Tom Petty and James Taylor all playing at the Ross School in the East Hampton, Long Island, NY. This 5 concert package, called Social, will treat all 1,000 guests to celebrity chefs, free parking (safe to assume valet?), and your seating will include daybeds, ottomans, and Moroccan pillows.

The Ross School is Long Island’s largest private school, accepting students from pre-k through the end of high school. Because of its prime location to the Hamptons and expensive tuition, many of the students are children of extremely wealthy and influential parents, including Billy Joel’s daughter.

Bulldog Entertainment is the promoter of this event which is being marketed to a very specific group.

“Social will be marketed as a lifestyle, says Bulldog, to Wall Street executives, Hamptons socialites and the ultrarich.” - Wall Street Journal

The reason for such as high price tag is due to supply and demand. Bulldog CEO Joe Meli explains that prices for tickets that are resold by regular consumers go for over $1,00 on many cases on sites such as StubHub.com. The philosophy is if people are going to pay that much anyway, why not charge that from the start.

No thanks, I’d rather shell out $700 and have an amazing time at Bonnaroo.

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The famous station broadcasting to 92.3 fm has once again switched hands. As of 5pm Thursday afternoon, talk show station, 92.3 Free FM reverted back to its previous rock music format, 92.3 K-Rock.

Here are the current radio stations broadcasting rock music to the New York Metro area and Long Island:

102.3 fm - WBAB
Owned and operated by Cox Radio who also operates 106.1 WBLI

104.3 fm - The Q
Owned and operated by Clear Channel

92.3 fm - K-Rock
Owned and operated by CBS radio

94.7/94.9/104.5 fm - Radio X
Independently owned and operated

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If you go to Mr. Cheapo CD & Record Exchange in Commack, Long Island and purchase a new album that happens to include a cover of Baba O’Riley, you just deposited 9.10 cents into Pete Townshend’s band account. Even though it is a Who cover, released as a Who hit song, and performed by the band on several shows, only Pete is compensated. What allowed the cover to be made, and Pete to be paid is called a mechanical license.

A mechanical license is also known as a compulsory mechanical license. This type of license is automatically given as soon as a song is recorded and commercially released. The copyright owners cannot revoke this license as it is protected in the copyright laws of the US. As soon as the song is recorded and released, anyone can make a new recording of the song and sell it. There are restrictions detailing what kind of changes can be made; this is for recording an existing song, not to sample, or remix it.

Now back to The Who. Their songwriter was Pete Townshend, the guitarist of the band. This means that as the songwriter, he is the only one in the band with rights to the songs. As far as technicalities, Pete is a songwriter who happens to also play his songs on guitar. He also happens to have backup musicians and a singer to help preform and record the song. But Pete still owns it

A mechanical license allows anyone to record any song already released as long as the royalty rate (9.01 cents) is paid per every song sold. So if you buy that record with a recording of Baba O’Riley, the recording artist of that record has to pay royalties to the copyright owners, in this case Pete Townshend.

So when does the band get paid for its songs? Only for the sales of their recordings (mechanical licenses only apply to covers) and live performances. As the songwriter, Pete is compensated for every use of his songs. If the band wants to raise new money, they must preform the song live and be paid for putting on a live show. In fact, if the band is paid $10,000 each to play a show, Pete will get his $10,000 plus royalties for playing his songs.. I’d say he got the best deal out of everyone.

I would like to thank Bruce Coflin from The Firm and professor at Five Towns College for sharing this knowledge with me.

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