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Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet tour was the big winner at the sixth annual Billboard Touring Awards, taking home honors for Top Tour and Top Draw, which acknowledge the highest-grossing and highest-attended tours of the year, respectively. Madonna’s manager Guy Oseary won the Top Manager award.

The Billboard Touring Awards are based on worldwide data reported to Billboard Boxscore for the period Oct. 1, 2008, through Sept. 30, 2009. Other winners include Kenny Chesney’s Sun City Carnival tour for Chesney’s sixth straight Top Package award; Ill Divo for the Breakthrough award, U2 for the Top Boxscore award for the band’s shows at Croke Park in Dublin last July, and Dane Cook for the Top Comedy Tour award.

Additionally, Keith Urban received the Concert Marketing & Promotion Award for his Escape Together tour sponsored by Kingsford and KC Masterpiece, and Jonas Brothers received the Eventful Fans’ Choice Award, both determined by online voting. Warped tour founder Kevin Lyman received the Humanitarian Award, and Ozzy Osbourne was named Legend Of Live.

source: billboard

Malawi threatened on Thursday to arrest protesting villagers blocking construction of Madonna’s multi-million dollar girls academy, a new controversy for the singer in the African country where she has adopted two children.

About 140 villagers are demanding more money for land the government has leased to Madonna’s charity – Raising Malawi – for 99 years.

District Commissioner for Lilongwe Charles Kalemba, other senior government officials and Raising Malawi failed to reach an agreement in talks with representatives of the villagers on Thursday in a bid to resolve the dispute.

“If we cannot agree on this and if you cannot understand that this is government land, then I will have no choice but tell police to arrest you people for blocking development work on the site,” Kalemba told the village chief, Chinkhota.

Madonna launched the construction of the school last month and pledged to build similar facilities in other countries if the project succeeds.

The Raising Malawi Academy for Girls — in Chinkhota village about 15 km (10 miles) outside the capital Lilongwe — is expected to be completed in two years and will admit 500 girls from the small southern African country’s 28 districts. The construction is expected to cost $15 million.

source: reuters

“Ciao Italia” Special will be aired on Tuesday, November 17 at 10.45 PM on Fox Italia
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Warner Music Japan confirmed the release of Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet Tour CD+DVD this December. Bonus features will include 30 Minutes of Behind The Scene Footage.

Actor Ethan Hawke on Saturday praised Madonna for her boldness in speaking out against discrimination against Gypsies, words that provoked boos from thousands of fans at her concert in Romania.

Hawke, visiting Romania to help promote his mother’s charity supporting education for Gypsy children, placed the pop superstar alongside Bob Marley and John Lennon as part of a tradition of artists speaking out against racism.

“She transcended being a pop star,” he told reporters. “She drew international attention and shone the spotlight on a level of racism and the need for greater education,” Hawke said.

At an August concert in Bucharest on her “Sticky & Sweet” tour, Madonna called for an end to widespread discrimination against Eastern Europe’s Gypsies, also known as Roma. Thousands of fans responded by booing her.

“I don’t have an agenda, Madonna doesn’t have an agenda. We aren’t politicians,” Hawke said.

Hawke, 38, was to speak later Saturday at the Ovidiu Rom charity Halloween ball. He and his mother, Leslie Hawke, the charity’s president, were already dressed in costume: the actor in top hat and tails and his mother in a Japanese-style kimono, black wig and geisha-like makeup.

source: ap

Madonna has left Malawi after a nearly weeklong visit with her family, airport and charity officials said Saturday.

Officials said Madonna flew out of the southern African country on Friday. The 51-year-old celebrity arrived in the impoverished country on Sunday accompanied by her four children — daughters Lourdes and Mercy, and sons Rocco and David. Mercy and David were adopted from Malawi.

While in Malawi, she broke ground for her $15 million Raising Malawi Academy for Girls and visited the orphanage that cared for her son David before she adopted him.

Madonna’s Raising Malawi, a charity founded in 2006 when she first visited the country, helps feed, educate and provide medical care for some of Malawi’s orphans.

Malawi, a nation of 12 million, is one of the poorest countries in the world. About 500,000 children have lost a parent to AIDS.

source: ap

Madonna has promised electricity to a village in Malawi, the impoverished southern African country where she runs a charity organization and from which she has adopted two children.

Speaking in Mphandula, some 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Malawi’s capital, Lilongwe, the singer said Thursday: “I know you work in darkness. I will bring you electricity.”

Madonna’s Raising Malawi charity already has donated $500,000 for a child care center in the village that feeds and educates 3,000 orphaned children.

Madonna arrived in Malawi on Sunday accompanied by her four children. On Monday she broke ground for her $15-million Raising Malawi Academy for Girls.

source: ap