Yikes! Brandy Performs to an Empty Stadium

By Elizabeth Durand | Stop The Presses! – 4 hours ago

 

Brandy performs in South Africa (Getty Images)In retrospect, it seems like someone should have said something sooner.

Brandy was secretly slated to be the surprise grand finale at the Nelson Mandela Sports and Culture Day, but since fans had no idea the singer would be the final act at the end of a packed schedule, almost all of them had left the building by the time she stepped on stage. Oops.

To put it in perspective, the FNB stadium in Soweto, South Africa, holds 90,000 guests and had been packed the entire day. When Brandy came out for her big moment, however, only 40 people remained. Oh, and reportedly, the lights were on (which was probably one of the reasons guests thought this shindig was done).

"Brandy performed to an empty stadium. With the stadium lights on," local musician Kabomo tweeted.
Other event-goers shared Kabomo's shock. Twitter user Crazy Girl Tutu (how we love that name), shared, "I gave up the min I saw the empty stadium. Brandy performing for the chairs!"

The empty stadium (AP Photo)

But Dawn Ngwenya thought Brandy had at least one fan left, tweeting, "Well Brandy is going to perform for herself and Mbaks only. Stadium now empty." Mbacks refers to Fikile Mbacks, South Africa's minister of sport, who likely had advance warning that the star would be showing up.
Faced with an empty stadium awash in light, Brandy didn't stick around long either. "People didn't know there was a concert after the games. No one knew Brandy was around. Maybe a 40 people audience," Kabomo shared on the social media site. "She sulked after two songs and walked off."

To be honest, we can't really blame her. And while we're fairly certain Brandy won't be running back to perform in South Africa again anytime soon, we also have a hunch that next time she does, people will know about it.

Adventures of Paso Jack Starring RG Ingersoll

Posted By InterNetics eMagazine at KDTN RADIO ONE RG’s ALL NITE FUNK BAND – Thousand Shadows – Single spurs SOS National search for missing singer

MEMPHIS TN (IFS) – The new unreleased dance single by RG’s All Nite Funk Band “Thousand Shadows” has started to race up the National and Global charts for the singer, Diane Anderson who has been missing for over twenty years. Anderson, one of the last recording artists with the Gordy Family empire disappeared after signing a long term contract. She has been musically silenced for over twenty-five years. Ingersoll along with longtime Platinum Sound Records president, Debby Clinton; Prentiss Anderson, longtime record producer and artist are helping in the hunt of Diane. The project is taking on a life on its own, and a television campaign is in the works for her whereabouts. The Single is being used as an S.O.S. - E.T. Call Home Moment. Ingersoll prays that the outcome is a positive outcome. We will deal with the outcome at the time of discovery. If you have any information on the whereabouts of Diane Anderson of Motown Records and HOTRAX Productions, please give him a post at HOTRAX@hotmail.com. The last know photographs of Diane Anderson is with Merrell Fankhauser and Cindy Bandes doing the "Some Of Them Escaped It All" Sessions at Emerald City Recording Studios, in Pismo Beach, California around June 1985.

Using DNA To Trace Michelle Obama’s Past

Ancestry.com  |  09/12/2012

First Lady Michelle Obama always suspected that she had white ancestors. But she had no idea who they were. With DNA testing and research, I was able to solve that mystery and finally identify the white forbears who had remained hidden in her family tree for more than a century.
All across the country, growing numbers of people are turning to DNA testing as a tool to help unlock the secrets of their roots, using companies such as ancestry.com, among others. When I started researching my new book, “American Tapestry: The Story of the Black, White and Multiracial Ancestors of Michelle Obama,’’ I pored over historical documents that I found in local archives, courthouses and libraries as well as records that I found online on ancestry.com and other state and local databases. But I knew that DNA testing would be the only way to unearth the truth.

I suspected that Mrs. Obama’s white ancestors belonged to the white Shields family that had owned her great-great-great grandmother, Melvinia Shields. So I persuaded several descendants of the black and white Shields to do DNA testing.

The results showed that the two families were related. The DNA testing indicated that Melvinia’s owner’s son was the likely father of Melvinia’s biracial child, Dolphus Shields. (Dolphus Shields is the first lady’s great-great grandfather.)
This was painful news for many of the Shields descendants. They knew that that Melvinia might have been raped and that their kinship originated during slavery, one of the darkest chapters of our history.
But last month, members of both sides of the family – black and white — put aside the pain of the past. They got together for the very first time in Rex, Georgia at a ceremony to commemorate Melvinia’s life. They swapped family stories, posed for photographs, exchanged phone numbers and had a meal together.



It was something to see.

David Applin, who is Melvinia’s great-grandson, said the reunion was “wonderful.” And Jarrod Shields, who is the great-great-great grandson of Melvinia’s owner, described it as a day “my family will never forget.”

Get your AncestryDNA kit today!

This story was contributed by guest blog author Rachel L. Swarns

Rachel L. Swarns has been a reporter for the New York Times since 1995. She has written about domestic policy and national politics, reporting on immigration, the presidential campaigns of 2004 and 2008, and First Lady Michelle Obama and her role in the Obama White House. She has also worked overseas for the New York Times, reporting from Russia, Cuba, and southern Africa, where she served as the Johannesburg bureau chief. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband and two children.