RIP Mic Gillette founder of Tower of Power.

RIP Mic Gillette founder of Tower of Power. This man had monstrous chops! He could play the trombone at the bottom register and then pick up the trumpet and make it screech all night. 64 years old, gone too soon.

WILLIE COLÓN EN CALGARY FEB 27 CENTURY CASINO

Blanqueo de Dinero del Régimen Venezolano

Cultura 11 Ene 2016 - 9:10 pm

Carlos Muñoz (1943-2016)

Sigue siendo el rey

Luego de estar internado en la Clínica Reina Sofía de Bogotá, murió este lunes el actor santandereano. Su salud se había complicado tras ser operado de una hernia. Luto en el mundo de la actuación.

 

 

Carlos Muñoz fue operado el pasado 31 de diciembre, y desde entonces su estado de salud fue muy crítico.

Cuando llegó la televisión a Colombia todo cambió. Se inventaron en el país los sets, cambiaron los personajes, los guiones y las ideas. Cambiaron los espectadores, las formas, el fondo. El 13 de junio de 1954 no bastó con engalanar las voces y perfeccionar los sonidos contra la mesa frente a los micrófonos, ni simular el galopar de los caballos o el vuelo de los pájaros. Las primeras imágenes de la pantalla sacudieron al país. Carlos Muñoz (Puente Nacional, Santander, 1943) estuvo ahí: presenció desde dentro el espectáculo tres días después de haberse encendido el primer televisor en el país, el 15 de junio de 1954.

“Por esa época había un actor español en Colombia que se llamaba Alberto Catalá, le decíamos el papi Catalá. Él hizo un monólogo de esos que los españoles se saben. Ambientamos una taberna con jamones y chorizos pintados en un backing (panel que forma parte de la escenografía). No había nada corpóreo. Había una mesa y encima una botella que se suponía era de vino, unas copas y cuatro actores: Guillermo Rubiano, Gonzalo Vera Quintana, Fabio Camero y Carlos Muñoz. El papi estaba al lado de nosotros de pie con su monólogo y cada vez que él decía una frase contundente, nosotros exclamábamos: “Vamos hombre”, “aj, aj, olé’ y fumábamos, y le pegábamos con los pies al suelo. Mi debut en la televisión colombiana hace 61 años fue como extra”, dijo el actor en una entrevista para El Espectador, en agosto del año pasado.

Luego vinieron los protagónicos: Pero sigo siendo el rey (interpretando a Adán Corona); Caballo viejo (novela en la que asumió el rol de Epifanio del Cristo Martínez) y San Tropel (donde personificó al padre Pío V Quintero).

 

 

Los premios: cinco Indias Catalina en las categorías de Mejor Actor, Mejor Actor del Siglo, Mejor Actor de Reparto y el Premio a Toda una Vida. También fue ganador de tres premios TVyNovelas por sus papeles en las producciones La fuerza del poder, Chepe fortuna y ¿Dónde carajos está Umaña?, entre otros, como tres Simón Bolívar, un Precolombino de Oro y dos placas del Canal Caracol.

Se fue a México y fue político. Después de un tiempo la televisión le dio la espalda: “Cada vez hay más homenajes, más pergaminos, condecoraciones... Todo eso. Resulta que la realidad es que soy bueno para eso, pero no soy bueno para trabajar. ¿Por qué si puedo ser tan interesante para hacer entrevistas, contar mi vida y hablar de mis 70 años de experiencia profesional no me tienen en cuenta para trabajar? Para trabajar si no soy importante. No lo entiendo”, agregó Muñoz.

Antes de estar internado en la Clínica Reina Sofía de Bogotá, Carlos Muñoz hacía, por lo menos, tres entrevistas semanales donde contaba los pormenores de su carrera, los impasses del oficio de actor y donde repetía sin cansancio estar un poco decepcionado de la “ligereza” con la que se toma ahora el arte de actuar. Su presencia en la televisión fue relegada a papeles débiles, secundarios y sin mayor profundidad. La última novela que grabó, ¿Dónde carajos está Umaña?, fue hace tres años. Vivió sus últimos años de dictar charlas en universidades, asesorar y grabar las promos del Canal Uno.

Así despide el país a uno de sus actores más importantes y legendarios: con homenajes, una habitación llena de diplomas y reconocimientos, con distinciones, pero con un olvido amargo, un silencio profundo y una indiferencia a la experiencia. Se despidió de Carlos Muñoz con muchos homenajes, pero pocas oportunidades para que él hiciera lo que siempre amó: actuar.

Tomas Mis Manos (Willie Colón)

NUEVA YORK (Willie Colón)

Do you know who this is a photo of?

Amazing...must read

Eugene Jacques Bullard

Terry Dunn

August 28, 2015 ·

This is too cool not to share:

Do you know who this is a photo of? Chances are you don’t, but don’t feel bad because probably not one American in one million do...es, and that is a National tragedy. His name is Eugene Jacques Bullard, and he is the first African-American fighter pilot in history. But he is also much more then that: He’s also a national hero, and his story is so incredible that I bet if you wrote a movie script based on it Hollywood would reject it as being too far-fetched.

Bullard was an expat living in France, and when World War 1 broke out he joined the French Infantry. He was seriously wounded, and France awarded him the Croix de Guerre and Medaille Militaire. In 1916 he joined the French air service and he first trained as a gunner but later he trained as a pilot. When American pilots volunteered to help France and formed the famous Lafayette Escadrille, he asked to join but by the time he became a qualified pilot they were no longer accepting new recruits, so he joined the Lafayette Flying Corps instead. He served with French flying units and he completed 20 combat missions.

When the United States finally joined the war, Bullard was the only member of the Escadrille or the French Flying Corps who was NOT invited to join the US Air Service. The reason? At that time the Air Service only accepted white men.

Now here is the part that almost sounds like a sequel to ‘Casablanca’: After WWI Bullard became a jazz musician in Paris and he eventually owned a nightclub called ‘L’Escadrille’. When the Germans invaded France and conquered it in WW2, his Club, and Bullard, became hugely popular with German officers, but what they DIDN’T know was that Bullard, who spoke fluent German, was actually working for the Free French as a spy. He eventually joined a French infantry unit, but he was badly wounded and had to leave the service.

By the end of the war, Bullard had become a national hero in France, but he later moved back to the U.S. where he was of course completely unknown. Practically no one in the United States was aware of it when, in 1959, the French government named him a national Chevalier, or Knight.

In 1960, the President of France, Charles DeGaulle, paid a state visit to the United States and when he arrived he said that one of the first things he wanted to do was to meet Bullard. That sent the White House staff scrambling because most of them, of course, had never even heard of him. They finally located him in New York City, and DeGaulle traveled there to meet him personally. At the time, Eugene Bullard was working as … An elevator operator.

Not long after Eugene Bullard met with the President of France, he passed away, and today very, very few Americans, and especially African-Americans, even know who he is. But, now YOU do, don’t you? And I hope you’ll be able to find opportunities to tell other people about this great American hero that probably only 1 American in 1 Million has ever heard of.

S.China Sea tensions surge as China lands plane on artificial island

S.China Sea tensions surge as China lands plane on artificial island 1 / 17

Reuters

Greg Torode and Michael Martina4 hrs ago

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© Cliff Owen/AP Photo A photograph showing an island that China is building on the Fiery Cross Reef in the South China Sea is displayed by Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain, R-Az…China's first landing of a plane on one of its new island runways in the South China Sea shows Beijing's facilities in the disputed region are being completed on schedule and military flights will inevitably follow, foreign officials and analysts said.

China's increasing military presence in the disputed sea could effectively lead to a Beijing-controlled air defence zone, they said, ratcheting up tensions with other claimants and with the United States in one of the world's most volatile areas.

Chinese foreign ministry officials confirmed on Saturday that a test flight by a civilian plane landed on an artificial island built in the Spratlys, the first time Beijing has used a runway in the area.

Vietnam launched a formal diplomatic protest while Philippines Foreign Ministry spokesman Charles Jose said Manila was planning to do the same. Both have claims to the area that overlap with China.

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"That's the fear, that China will be able take control of the South China Sea and it will affect the freedom of navigation and freedom of overflight," Jose told reporters.

In Washington, State Department spokesman John Kirby said China's landing of the plane "raises tensions and threatens regional stability."

Senator John McCain, the chairman of the influential U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, criticised the Obama administration for delaying further "freedom of navigation" patrols within 12 nautical miles of the islands built by China.

China has been building runways on the artificial islands for over a year, and the plane's landing was not a surprise.

The runway at the Fiery Cross Reef is 3,000 metres (10,000 feet) long and is one of three China was constructing on artificial islands built up from seven reefs and atolls in the Spratlys archipelago.

The runways would be long enough to handle long-range bombers and transport craft as well as China's best jet fighters, giving them a presence deep into the maritime heart of Southeast Asia that they have lacked until now.

Chinese officials have repeatedly stressed that the new islands would be mostly for civilian use, such as coast guard activity and fishing research.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said at the weekend that the test flight was intended to check whether the runway met civilian aviation standards and fell "completely within China's sovereignty".

However, military landings on the islands were now "inevitable", said Leszek Buszynski, a visiting fellow at the Australian National University's Strategic and Defence Studies Centre.

An air defence zone, while unlikely soon, was feasible and possible in future once China's built up its air strength, he said.

"The next step will be, once they've tested it with several flights, they will bring down some of their fighter air power - SU-27s and SU-33's - and they will station them there permanently. That's what they're likely to do."

DE FACTO DEFENCE ZONE

Ian Storey, a South China Sea expert at Singapore's ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute, said he expected tensions to worsen as China used its new facilities to project power deeper into the South China Sea.

Even if China stopped short of formally declaring an Air Defence Identification Zone, known as an ADIZ, Beijing's need to protect its new airstrips and other facilities could see it effectively operating one.

Work is well underway to complete a range of port, storage and personnel facilities on the new islands, U.S. and regional officials have said.

Fiery Cross is also expected to house advanced early warning radars and military communications facilities, they said.

"As these facilities become operational, Chinese warnings to both military and civilian aircraft will become routine," Storey said.

"These events are a precursor to an ADIZ, or an undeclared but de facto ADIZ, and one has to expect tensions to rise."

China sparked condemnation from the United States and Japan in late 2013 when it declared an ADIZ over the East China Sea, covering uninhabited islands disputed with Tokyo.

Hua, the Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman, said on Monday that there were no immediate plans for an ADIZ in the South China Sea.

"The decision will be based on our judgment of the situation and our needs," she aid, adding that Beijing respected other nations' rights to international freedoms of navigation and overflight.

However, regional military officials say they are logging increased warnings to aircraft from Chinese radio operators, including some from ground stations on Fiery Cross reef.

China claims most of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of world trade ships every year. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan have rival claims.

The United States has no claim in the South China Sea, but has been highly critical of China's assertiveness and says it will protect freedom of navigation.

In Washington, McCain said that the lack of U.S. action after a navy patrol near the islands in October was allowing China to continue to "pursue its territorial ambitions" in the region.

U.S. officials remain committed to carrying out further "freedom of navigation" patrols near the disputed islands, but are still debating the timing of another patrol, said one U.S. defense official, who was not authorised to speak publicly.

(Additional reporting by Andrea Shalal in WASHINGTON, Megha Rajagopalan in BEIJING, Manuel Mogato in MANILA and Matt Siegel in SYDNEY; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

S.China Sea tensions surge as China lands plane on artificial island

@williecolon Willie Colón China Cubana (Willie Colón)