DJ Frank E: "New Madonna on the way!"

DJ Frank E Twitters:

"New Madonna on the way! Madonna fans - make sure to keep asking her for it. Maybe she'll put it out sooner".

Watch 10 ‘Sticky & Sweet’ Tour Videos!

Madonna.com

10 videos taken from the upcoming ‘Sticky & Sweet’ Tour DVD are now available for streaming for owners of a BlackBerry Bold from AT&T!

The selection includes the following performances:

Candy Shop
Beat Goes On
Vogue
Die Another Day
Music
Spanish Lesson
Miles Away
La Isla Bonita
Get Stupid
4 Minutes

For more info, please click HERE

Sticky & Sweet Tour 2008 - Some Funny Moments

Sticky & Sweet Tour 2009 - 1 million tickets sold!

Billboard

Madonna’s European continuation of last year’s Sticky & Sweet tour, also produced by Live Nation, is selling out again; it has already moved 1 million tickets worth $100 million in total, according to tour producer Arthur Fogel at Live Nation.

HOW MADONNA FOUND HER JESUS

NY Post

She's always liked them hot, young and Latin, but Madonna's latest boy toy has another special charm -- he was a Kabbalist before they even met.

Jesus Luz, 22, immersed himself in the religion while he was still a struggling model in Rio de Janeiro. Since the late 1990s, Madonna has been an avid follower of the movement, which stems from Jewish mysticism and equates God to a ray of light.

"Madonna must have thought she met God when she found Jesus," said a Kabbalah devotee in New York, noting that "Jesus Luz" translates from Portuguese as "Jesus Light."

Leonardo Reis, manager of the Kabbalah Center in Rio, helped Luz with his studies starting in July 2008, six months before Jesus met Madonna.

"All I can say to you is that Madonna is really, really happy with Jesus," Reis said. "When she found out he was into Kabbalah, they really started to hit it off."

Reis organized a special Shabbat dinner for the couple and their friends after they met at a Rio photo shoot last December. The dinner, complete with lit candles and guests clothed in white, was held at sunset in Madonna's luxe suite at the Copacabana Palace Hotel with its stunning views of the Atlantic.

Spirituality has always been a part of Luz's life. His mother, Cristiane Regina da Silva, 37, is a member of the "Evangelicals," a growing Protestant cult movement in Brazil. His father, an administrator at a public hospital in the Rio suburbs, says he decided to name his son Jesus because he admired the philosophy of Christ.

But four years after baby Jesus was born, the family split. Cristiane, a colorist at a tony Ipanema salon, raised Luz on her own in a gritty part of downtown Rio.

Still, she was determined to give him the kind of life she never had. By the time he was an adolescent, Cristiane managed to save enough money to enroll him in a private prep school and encouraged his modeling career.

Luz had star quality from a young age. At his prep school, girls sought out his autograph because of his intense blue eyes, said a former girlfriend.

Those eyes must have also been a hit with photographer Steven Klein, who chose Luz's picture from a stack of portfolio shots provided by model agent Sergio Mattos.

According to Mattos, Klein offered Luz and two other male models $100 each for a two-day shoot in Rio for W magazine. The models didn't know they would be working alongside Madonna until they arrived at the session in December.

After the first day of shooting, Luz went home to his mother in such a good mood that he insisted on celebrating.

"The first picture session with Madonna resulted in his coming home really happy," said Cristiane in an interview with a Brazilian magazine. "He even opened a bottle of champagne."

But not everyone in Luz's circle was joining in the fun. Shortly after the W shoot, Jesus dumped girlfriend Krishna Siqueira, a sultry model who introduced him to Kabbalah when they started dating last July.

"My mother gave Jesus letters of the Kabbalah for him to meditate on," said Siqueira, who like many of Luz's friends lost touch with the model after Madonna whisked him to New York this year.

Luz's move to the Big Apple has paid off. The boy toy, who is also devoted to macrobiotic cuisine and is fluent in English, is now a high-profile Ford Model who recently shot a Dolce & Gabbana's menswear campaign for fall/winter 2009-2010.

Although Ford Models refused to say how much Luz makes per gig, a Brazilian newspaper reported that he was commanding a $100,000 fee to appear at a local fashion show shortly after he started dating Madonna. Luz's earnings have also enabled him to finance his mother's recent move into an upscale apartment in Ipanema.

In New York, Luz is now a regular at hotspots like the Waverly Inn and earlier this month escorted Madonna to the Metropolitan Museum's Costume Institute Ball, considered the city's society event of the year.

He's friends with Marc Jacobs and the famous designer's Brazilian companion, Lorenzo Martone, who has become a mentor to the young model. In March, Jacobs wrote a letter to US authorities to help Luz obtain a work permit here.

Every Saturday morning, Madonna and Luz attend services at the Kabbalah Centre in Midtown, and he spends his free time jogging in Central Park, reading Deepak Chopra and attending a school for DJs, friends say.

"His passion is electronic music," his best friend in Rio told The Post. "He is really working hard to become a DJ."

Luis Heitor Luz, Jesus' 46-year-old father, told The Post his son is firmly committed to the pop star. "I know he loves Madonna, and I wouldn't be surprised if they get married," he said. "People speak about the difference in their ages but this is nonsense. I was 23 and his mother was 14 when Jesus was born."

Although it was recently reported that Madonna and Jesus planned to wed in a Kabbalah commitment ceremony, a spokeswoman for the pop queen last week flatly denied the rumors.

But in Rio, a Kabbalist who knows the couple said, "There is no need for marriage. They are already spiritually joined."

Mina on Madonna

Italian Vanity Fair via Madonna Tribe

"Madonna is such a powerful corporation. She writes, she sings, produces and controls everything she does. She has all my respect.
There's no mercy in show business, and still she's able to do what she wants and with tremendous results. My daughter Benedetta is crazy for her and keeps hammering me with "listen to this.. listen to that... And though it was a bit forced on me, I now have my own true knowledge of 'Madonna culture'. Hats off to her!"

Mina, one of the most successful Italian pop singers in the world, talking about Madonna.

Dona Summer on Madonna

Sun-Sentinel

"I was sitting around thinking I should do something. I was thinking about design school. A friend said, 'Are you out of your mind? Do an album.' But I like privacy and I like my space. I like being with my family. You have to be in the right frame of mind. You can't be like 'don't touch me' to your fans or saying 'I don't want to sign autographs.' I think I was exhausted for a lot of years. I have to take my hat off to people like Madonna. They keep doing it."

Madonna with Jesus and the kids at the Kabbalah centere - 15-16/05/09

Photos from Friday: Madonnadownload

Photos from Saturday:





fadedyouthblog


More photos from Saturday: WENN

5,000 more Sofia tickets to go on sale

The Sofia Echo via Madonna Tribe

The organisers of the Madonna show have decided to allocate 5000 additional tickets which will be released on general sale May 19. Reportedly, the demand for the precious tickets has been so great that a decision was made to release a further batch. There has been no comment from the organisers whether the increase of capacity will bear on the safety of the people who are in the pit.

Tickets can now be purchased nationwide from Ticketpro or online, at www.ticketpro.com

When Madonna first announced at the beginning of May that she will perform in Sofia, the news became a complete sensation.

Madonna’s first ever concert in Bulgaria will be on Saturday August 29 2009 in Sofia at 8pm at Vassil Levski National Stadium. The concert, one of the entertainment highlights of the year, is expected to draw tens of thousands of fans not just from Bulgaria but from all over South East Europe, proving a stiff test for Bulgarian police.

The most expensive tickets, for those seeking to stay inside the Golden Circle just metres from Madonna, will cost 200 leva. People willing to stand in front of the stage will pay 150 leva.
The cheapest tickets, in the pit, cost 100 leva. Seat prices will vary between 110, 135 and 165 leva depending on location.

Madonna’s concert in Bulgaria is part of her Sticky & Sweet Tour in Europe. She will reportedly arrive with a crew of 250 people, and enough equipment to make her concert the biggest show Bulgarian fans have ever seen.

William Orbit talks about working with Madonna

Oakenfold: 'Madonna songs cutting edge'

Digital Spy

Paul Oakenfold has described the new material he has recorded with Madonna as "cutting edge sounds combined with classic Madonna".

The pair spent a week together in the studio last month producing songs for the 'Miles Away' singer's upcoming greatest hits package.

Oakenfold confirmed that the new material will be previewed when he opens for Madonna on the second leg of her 'Sticky And Sweet' world tour, which kicks off in London on July 4.

The DJ will also play at the Wireless Festival before supporting Madonna on European dates in Italy, France, Spain, Germany, Russia and Eastern Europe.

His new album Pop Killer is expected to be released in 2010 and features collaborations with the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ryan Tedder and Ce-Lo.

Two Classics are back!

Madonna Tribe

The extension of the Madonna tour is about to start in less than two months and here at MadonnaTribe we've heard a few things buzzing around.
Rehearsals are planned to take place in New York and starting at the beginning of June. They will approximatively go on for a month before flying to London for the premiere on July 4th.

As for the changes in the Sticky & Sweet set list a couple of beloved old classics will be replacing two songs of the 2008 lineup. The songs considered at the moment are the 1983 First Album classic hit Holiday, making its comeback in a Madonna tour and Dress You Up, the old fan favourite from Like A Virgin!

The inclusion of such classic songs will surely convince the people who were unsure about this tour extension that Madonna is once again trying something new, by strengthening her already successful show of 2008, reinventing it by adding more fan favourite oldies but goodies!

3,000 more tickets for Werchter go on sale

RTL via Madonna Tribe

Ticktes for the Sticky & Sweet Tour concert of Saturday, July 11 at the Werchter festival site sold out in no time, but this came as no surprise considering that the show marks the first Madonna live appearance in the Belgium.

What can be more interesting to hear for the Madonna fans - especially those who did not manage to grab a ticket when they went on sale - is that the production team paid a visit on site last week, giving them a chance to carefully examine the layout plans.
As a result of this site survey a number of entries previously reserved to the production, plus a number of unpaid reservations tickets have now been released, making a total of 3,000 tickets being available to purchase.

Tickets are now available via www.proximusgoformusic.be and the Proximus Go For Music hotline.

Live Nation Inc. (LYV) Q1 2009 Earnings Call Transcript

Seeking Alpha

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to our 2009 first quarter conference call. Our first quarter results were in line with our expectations on our key metrics that indicate that we are on track to deliver our 2009 plan. Our first quarter is historically the slowest period of the year but an important time as it provides a window into how the full year will end up.

(...) We have a very strong line up this year. U2's 360 Tour has generated incredible demand, selling 2.5 million tickets. Madonna's extended leg in Europe has been another sell out smash and artists such as Nickleback, AC/DC, Coldplay, Aerosmith, Jimmy Buffet and the Jonas Brothers are well on track to sell out some strong shows.

Q: Obviously some bands are selling well and some others, and always the case and you've obviously got a long history of knowing how different bands sell in different venues and get a sense of how to price them on the guarantee side as well. Are you seeing in any cases, do you have any flexibility in any cases with some tours that are simply not performing as you'd hoped? Do you have any kind of out or flexible clauses with artists on the guarantee to sort of the bang it down a little bit if certain thresholds aren't met?

Generally you have a contract with the band, you have a contract. But we both have the same motive. A band does not want to get on stage and have empty seats. So I would say to you that 99% of the time, if a tour goes on sale and it's not pacing well, you are sitting with the manager and agent coming up with creative ways to sell more tickets. Reduce the prices, do more promotion, excite the sale, and that end.

The good news is this. The reason we planned, and that's why I don't want any of the Q1 decline in North America to come across as consumer purchase behavior versus self implied. We knew that we had a really strong year in North America last year. We know that there's a certain amount of shows we need to fill the pipe, and then some of the shows above and beyond that are the gravy that help you deliver some higher profit or sometimes bring down your profit.

We went into 2009 with a very purposeful disciplined plan that said, let's not try to grow market share in North America this year. Let's go after the for sure bands, the for sure business. We'll leave a few bands on the table. We'll let Age's and others book a few that we might have historically chased harder.

So we purposely went out this year to say we'll fill the pipe to the level that we know we can drive our operating income. We will not go after all and every band. We'll reduce our risk and we'll go after the more for sure bands.

So we're sitting here right now and the good news I can tell, we're not sitting here right now with any tours or any shows of magnitude that are dogs, that are going to take a hit on our P&L in any big sense.

We've got a pretty solid line up of superstars and downward and we're happy with the level we have right now and we don't see any big losers this year that will impact our operating income.

Q: (...) Are you just selling the tickets a little earlier this year or are you just understating that you're going to have a strong summer.

A bit of both. I've kind of given you guidance which I don't typically do on where we think we'll end up on attendance by the end of the year. So you can look at our historic 52 million tickets last year or all in and figure out where we'll be.

We built a plan this year that said the economic crisis has to affect you somewhere. We know though that we had a super strong slate because of the stadiums and Madonna and U2 and our festival business is on fire in Europe which is a really early on sale. So we knew International was going to have a strong year, so we knew we could look for growth from international.

We knew North America we had a super year last year in our amphitheaters and we didn't want to chase that exact market share in some of those shows and get ourselves into any risky shows to try to match that exact number.

(...) So we're just looking at the strong on sales. There's a little bit of head room. In this business it's all about there's not bad bands, there's just bad deals. So when you have a strong solid plan, you don't have to then chase a lot of extra which sometimes can get you in trouble.

Q: As far as the disclosure on the Artist Nation, do you plan on doing some type of metrics and judge how the Artist Nation's doing in the future?

Absolutely we will. Probably towards the end of the year, Q3 or Q4 probably. I think once we have the entire Madonna tour cycle wrapped up, the U2 won't be wrapped by then but it will be in full motion. JZ will be in; hopefully Shakira will be staring to go out. So I think by the end of the year we'll be able to talk about how those bands did not only from a touring but a sponsorship, accessory sales and all of the pieces of how they all added up against our investment.

Madonna, Africa and Child Mortality

Huffington Post

The problem is straightforward: more than nine million children die each year in Africa. That is the number of people in the entire state of New Jersey.

African kids die from infectious diseases such as HIV, TB, malaria, respiratory illnesses, diarrhea, worms, parasites, and vaccine-preventable diseases, malnutrition and -- far too often -- during childbirth itself.

In an exclusive interview with HuffPo, Sonia Ehrlich Sachs, M.D., M.P.H. spoke to me about Africa, child mortality, and an intelligent, charismatic women who has learned much about both: Madonna.


Millennium Villages help care for children in Africa.

Dr. Sonia Sachs is a public health specialist and serves as the health coordinator for the Millennium Villages Project at the Earth Institute at Columbia University.

Dr. Sonia Sachs is a public health specialist and serves as the health coordinator for the Millennium Villages Project at the Earth Institute at Columbia University.

She is also married to another brilliant thought leader and global citizen, Prof. Jeffry Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute, and Special Advisor to the U.N. Secretary General on the Millennium Development Goals.

Sonia is the pediatrician who was with Madonna in Malawi when the singer met one-year old David Banda. Sonia explained to me that the evening David left the orphanage to spend his first night with Madonna in a hotel in Lilongwe, he was very ill and could have died, as did his other siblings before him. She credits the entertainer for saving the child's life.

I had not realized that Madonna's project, Raising Malawi, was helping to support one of Jeff's Millennium Villages near Lilongwe. That was one of the reasons Sonia was with Madonna on the trip.

David Banda with his adoptive mother, Madonna.

"David would have died that evening or the following day if it were it not for Madonna. I can tell you with certainty that he would have died had he stayed in the orphanage," Sonia told me.

"The evening David was handed over to Madonna, he had a very high fever and was in acute respiratory distress -- meaning he had difficulty breathing."

"We took him to a private clinic, where a colleague and I examined him carefully, took a chest X-ray, diagnosed his respiratory infection, and treated him immediately with an inhaler, and intramuscular antibiotics. Lower respiratory infections like pneumonia are a common killer of so many children in Africa every year."

As founder of Orphans International Worldwide, I have experienced the death of one of our children in Haiti. The pain of losing a child is indescribable.

Last fall, Sonia presented to our Orphans International Worldwide Congress -- held at N.Y.U. Medical School -- on the grim story of African child mortality. She explained about preventable and treatable conditions such as extreme nutrient deficiencies, infectious diseases and unsafe childbirth.

The deaths of African children are all about food, water, and cooking stoves. Sonia explained that there is usually no public health system in place to address this tragic litany of otherwise very approachable issues.

Simple, non-clinical health interventions make a big difference in saving lives, Sonia believes. Improved nutrition through school meals, better cooking stoves to reduce open fire and indoor air pollution, clean water, mosquito bed nets, and de-worming are all essential, interventions needed but not affordable by people living in extreme poverty.

Through her work, Sonia has come to know Madonna a little bit. "I have found Madonna to be an impressively solid person dedicated to her children and to the welfare of thousands of neglected orphans in Malawi."

A Millennium Village doctor examining a child.

Sonia has personally witnessed Madonna's compassion and motherly instincts more than once.

In Malawi some people practice witchcraft. On occasion, a boy's entire genitalia are removed by villagers based on ancient superstition. One little boy Madonna met had been so mutilated he could not stop wetting himself. The physical and emotional suffering was unbearable.

Madonna held the boy and pledged to care for him, which she has done to this day by looking after his medical and educational needs. Thanks to Madonna, the boy continues to improve.

Children learning in a Millennium Village in Africa.

Madonna somehow speaks to the children of the world. From Africa to Asia and the Americas. My own teenage son Mathew -- adopted at the age of ten months from Indonesia -- has informed me that if I ever meet Madonna without him, he will disown me.

More from the interview with Jesus' dad

More from the interview Jesus' dad, Hector Luis Pinto da Luz, gave to Quem:

'He is very happy and this ceremony would just confirm that.'
He was replying to reports the couple are due to take part in a Kabbalah commitment ceremony in New York as soon as this weekend.
In the new interview with Brazil's Quem magazine, Luiz Hector gave his son's relationship with Madonna the seal of approval.

My understanding is that this is just a consequence of what is happening. He is already living with her.

'I don't know if there will be an actual wedding. From what I have read there could be a sort of ritual, but I don't know Kabbalah... to know if it's valid and legal.'


In the interview Luiz Heitor also revealed Jesus is getting on very well with Madonna's three children.

'She has young children and he helps out with them,' he said.

'My son is charismatic, he likes children, he has an excellent relationship with her children. He plays football with them.'

But he flatly denied stories the pop star is paying $1,000 a week in English lessons for Jesus - and that she controls his phone usage.

He said: 'Those stories are lies, made up when the press have no information. He already spoke English long before meeting her, when he lived with an aunt in the US.

'It's also a lie that he can't speak on his cell phone near her.'

In fact, he says even he has spoken to Madonna and she was very pleasant.

'We've already spoken on the phone, in French because I don't speak English fluently, and she seemed like a normal person,' he said.

'She is calm, feminine - I didn't feel any harshness. She was very polite.'

And he adds that his son is not one to be easily taken by money and glamour.

'Obviously, he likes what is good, but he is not one to be impressed by materialism,' said Luiz Heitor.


Jesus' dad

"Filth And Wisdom" Release In Italy And Sweden

Madonna.com

Italian and Swedish Madonna fans, please note that ‘Filth And Wisdom’ will get a theatrical release in your country within the next few weeks.

The movie will be released in Sweden on May 15 and under the title of ‘Sacro e Profano’ in Italy on June 12.

Please check your local listings for more details.