HONDA BATTLE OF THE BANDS ANNOUNCES 2010 INVITEES

Three months ago, 45 marching bands from the nation’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) began the journey down the “Road to the Honda,” all competing for a spot in the 2010 Honda Battle of the Bands (HBOB) Invitational Showcase.

Out of 45 competing marching bands from the nation’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), eight have been chosen to perform in January at the 2010 Honda Battle of the Bands (HBOB) Invitational Showcase.

Representing varied music and performance styles ranging from precision to high-stepping, the eight headlining bands are:

• Albany State University “Marching Rams” (Albany, Georgia)

• Clark Atlanta University “Mighty Marching Panthers” (Atlanta, Georgia)

• Florida A&M University “Marching 100” (Tallahassee, Florida)

• North Carolina Central University “Marching Sound Machine” (Durham, North Carolina)

• Prairie View A&M University “Marching Storm” (Prairie View, Texas)

• Southern University “Human Jukebox Marching Band” (Baton Rouge, Louisiana)

• Tuskegee University “Marching Crimson Pipers” (Tuskegee, Alabama)

• Virginia State University “Trojan Explosion Marching Band” (Petersburg, Virginia)

On January 30, 2010, the bands will perform for a crowd of 60,000 at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta and prove why they are the best of the best.

Marking its eighth year, the Honda Battle of the Bands is the only national scholarship program that showcases an important facet of HBCU heritage and culture – music education.

The eight winning band programs chosen to participate in this year’s Invitational Showcase will be awarded $20,000 by American Honda for their music programs in addition to the $1,000 grant they received for participation in the pre-qualifying fall campus event tour. Through this program Honda is awarding a total of $205,000 in scholarships to HBCU music programs for the 2009-10 academic year, and since the beginning of the program, has awarded grants in excess of $1 million.

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Filmmaker Sues Chris Rock’s Film about Black Hair

A documentary filmmaker is expected to ask a Los Angeles federal judge today to stop the scheduled nationwide release of Chris Rock’s film about African-American hair, contending the comedian stole the
concept from her.

Regina Kimbell’s complaint of copyright infringement and unfair competition claims her 2006 documentary, “My Nappy Roots,” is the basis for Rock’s “Good Hair,” which is slated to open Friday.

Rock has said in interviews that he got the idea for the film when his 6-year-old daughter asked him why she didn’t have “good hair.”

Kimbell is seeking $5 million in damages and an injunction preventing Rock and HBO Films from distributing and showing “Good Hair” without Kimbell’s consent and from “designating anything other than ‘My Nappy Roots’ as the inspiration” for Rock’s film.

Rock’s attorney did not immediately a call seeking comment on Kimbell’s complaint.

In Kimbell’s feature-length film, celebrities and others discuss such hair techniques and styles as the conk, press and curl, the Afro, the Jheri curl, and dreadlocks. The film won the best documentary prize at the 2007
Hollywood Black Film Festival.

Rock’s documentary, “Good Hair,” also uses celebrities to examine the lengths black women go to keep their hair looking more like the hair of Europeans.

Kimbell claims “Good Hair” copies “My Nappy Roots” because the two films allegedly share many “striking similarities.”

The lawsuit contends Kimbell, a Los Angeles resident, screened her film for Rock in 2007 on the set of Rock’s TV series, “Everybody Hates Chris.” It was there, she alleges, that Rock got the idea for his own film on the same subject.

The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles on Oct. 5, seeks a preliminary injunction barring the movie from opening nationwide and “no less than $5 million” in damages and attorneys’ fees.

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