Watch BRAVO! Arts & Minds Special – The Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction broadcast Saturday to Wednesday

Watch BRAVO! Arts & Minds Special – The Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction broadcast Saturday to Wednesday
Coverage can be seen nationally Saturday, Feb. 20, Sunday, Feb. 21, Tuesday, Feb. 23 & Wednesday, Feb. 24
TORONTO, Feb. 19 - The fascinating story of this year's Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is the subject for this week’s Arts & Minds show. The show will air nationally on BRAVO! at various times a between this Saturday and next Wednesday. Broadcast journalist conducts an emotional interview with Ian Brown, the winner of this year’s Taylor Prize.
Devoted to capturing the suspense and excitement of the prestigious national book prize this special edition of Bravo's Arts & Minds will air Saturday, Feb. 20th, Sunday, Feb. 21st as well as on Tuesday, Feb. 23rd and Wednesday, Feb. 24th.
Viewers will see an interview between Todd and Brown that Bravo! Director Bernard Gauthier describes as “ an interview that is beyond riveting, the likes that arts TV has never seen!” Ian Brown, a columnist for the Globe and Mail wrote a book about Walker, his disabled son.
The show also highlights of the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction Author Luncheon, which capture the excitement and drama of the event, which was held in Toronto on February 8th. The special also includes comments and reaction from prize founder Noreen Taylor.
The Winner of the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is Ian Brown (Toronto) for his book The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Search For His Disabled Son, published by Random House Canada. The $25,000 prize was awarded Monday, February 8, 2010 at Toronto's Le Meridien King Edward Hotel. The remaining CTP finalists - John English, Daniel Poliquin, and Kenneth Whyte - each received $2,000.
Arts & Minds airs on Saturday February 20th at 7:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m; Sunday at 7:00 p.m; Tuesday at 8:30 a.m. and 8:00 p.m and Wednesday at 8:30 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. (All are Eastern Standard Times).
The prestigious Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction recognizes excellence in Canadian non-fiction writing. Since its inception the prize has fostered a growing interest in non-fiction, engaged Canadians in the genre of literary non-fiction, and boosted sales of the winning authors' books.
Founded in commemoration of the late Charles Taylor, one of Canada's foremost essayists and a prominent member of the Canadian literary community, the prize is awarded annually to the author whose book best combines a superb command of the English language, an elegance of style, and a subtlety of thought and perception.
The Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is presented by the Charles Taylor Foundation with the generous support of its partners: Ben McNally Books, Bravo! and Book Television, Canada Newswire (CNW), Event Source, Le Meridien King Edward Hotel, Quill & Quire, The Globe and Mail, and Windfields Farm.
Check www.bravo.ca for the complete listings. This program will also be available online at: www.bravo.ca/events/CharlesTaylorPrize/ To download high-resolution images of the Charles Taylor Prize winner and finalists, and their short listed Book covers please go to: www.thecharlestaylorprize.ca/2010/photogallery_10.asp For more information please visit: www.thecharlestaylorprize.ca, http://www.twitter.com/taylorprize
For further information: Media contact: Stephen Weir & Associates, Stephen Weir: (416) 489-5868, cell: (416) 801-3101, sweir5492@rogers.com; Linda Crane: (905) 257-6033, cell: (416) 727-0112, cranepr@cogeco.ca

Caribana Festival performers extend Olympic stay to do it again on Canada AM tomorrow

Performers wrap up their Olympic show on Tuesday afternoon - but more to come tomorrow with CTV's Canada AM.

Eleven performers from Toronto appeared on the Ontario Pavillion stage for the last time today at the Olympics in Vancouver. However, the show is not over just yet! CTV's Canada AM breakfast show has asked the performers to return to the Pavillion on Wednesday February 17th to do it one more time for their television viewers. The Canada AM segment begins tomorrow at 8.30 Pacific Time.
Audiences in Vancouver are experiencing some of the exciting entertainment that make the 3-week Scotiabank Festival Canada’s biggest tourist draw -- next to the Olympics. This year Scotiabank kicks off Tuesday July 13th at the Yonge Dundas Square. The parade will be held along Toronto’s waterfront on July 31st. The festival ends on Sunday August 1st with the DeScotiabank Caribana Lime at Ontario Place.
Even after the Scotiabank Caribana performers have left Vancouver, visitors to the Olympics will see breathtaking images from the annual Toronto festival. Last summer The Canadian Tourism Commission, in association with the Canada’s Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium, sent a film crew right onto the Scotiabank Caribana parade route and shot high definition footage to be used in a video postcard about the Festival.
The Caribana video postcard (one of two dozen made for the Olympics) has been reproduced into four lengths (2.5 minutes, 1 minute, 30 seconds, and 15 seconds), dubbed into several languages, and provided to over 200 official Olympic Games’ broadcasters around the world to be seem by a potential cumulative audience of over 10 billion people.
The Scotiabank Caribana Festival is an exciting three-week cultural explosion of Caribbean music, cuisine, revelry as well as visual and performing arts. Now in its 43rd year, it has become a major international event and the largest cultural festival of its kind in North America. As Scotiabank Caribana is an international cultural phenomenon, the great metropolis of Toronto and its environs will come alive as the city explodes with the pulsating rhythms and melodies of Calypso, Soca, Reggae, Chutney, and Steel Pan music. The Festival Management Committee oversees the running of North America’s largest outdoor festival. www.caribanafestival.com
VANCOUVER TEAM
Ontario Pavilion “CARIBANA”
1. Denise Hererra-Jackson ---- Festival Director
2. Roborta Atkinson ---- Manager
3. Martin Scott-Pascall ---- Artistic Director/Choreographer
4. Tara Eulith Woods ---- Calypsonian
5. Hameed Shaqq ---- Pannist
6. Denise Chang Kit ---- Masquerader/Dancer
7. Lysha DeFreitas ---- Masquerader/Dancer
8. Danielle Edwards ---- Masquerader/Dancer
9. Danielle Ramjattan ---- Masquerader/Dancer
10. Nicki Ramjass ---- Masquerader/Dancer
11. Catrina Ziesman ---- Masquerader/Dancer
12. Sakita Boodhoo ---- Masquerader/Dancer
13. Christiane Tetreault ---- Masquerader/Dancer
Cutline: Derrick Chan www.xpats.ca took the above photographs today at the Ontario Pavillion. Top photo - pannist Hameed Shaqq, second top photo shows the last dance of the performance. The second from bottom photograph shows the 11 performers and Festival director Denise Hererra-Jackson (sitting at left) and show manager Roborta Atkinson (sitting at right) out front of the Pavillion. The last photograph is again showing the last performance in progress.

Olympic Pictures of Caribana performers in Vancouver - on stage

CARIBANA FESTIVAL TEACHES OLYMPIC AUDIENCE HOW TO HAVE "MAS" APPEAL

Two pictures from today's performance by Toronto Caribana Festival performers are included with this e-mail. Cutline information:
* from the stage: Left to right, Danielle Ramjattan, Nicki Ramjass and Martin Scott-Pascall show Olympic goers how to play Mas! Scott-Pascall is also the Artist Director on the tour.
* Macomere Fifi (Eulith Woods) one of North America's best Calypsonian singer performs on stage at the Ontario Pavillion inside the Olympic grounds in Vancouver
An all-star cast of Mas Players, Calypso singers and Pan Artistes performed the first of three performancess at the Ontario Pavilion within the Olympic site in Vancouver.
The Ontario Government has built a 13,000 sq ft Pavilion at the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver to showcase the province’s leading technological, cultural and culinary advancements. As the largest summer festival in the province and the cultural jewel of the country, Scotiabank Caribana was approached to produce a 10 min video and to stage three - one hour performances, one each on February 14th, 15th and 16th.
The intent of the festival's participation is to help promote the City of Toronto and the Province of Ontario as a premier tourist destination to visit and do business. It will take the form of a 13-member team showcasing the various carnival arts; Mas’, Calypso and Steel pan.
The Ontario Pavilion is setting a new standard in creativity and innovation. It offers visitors a unique, one-of-a-kind, inspirational experience that will live on in their memories for years to come and reinforce Ontario’s Olympic brand message — “There’s No Place Like This…” An initiative of the Ministry of Tourism, the Pavilion will feature the best Ontario has to offer from a tourism perspective, featuring nightly concerts, culinary experiences, film, technology, the arts and a jaw dropping Scotiabank Caribana performance!
Audiences in Vancouver are experiencing some of the exciting entertainment that make the 3-week Scotiabank Festival Canada’s biggest tourist draw -- next to the Olympics. This year Scotiabank kicks off Tuesday July 13th at the Yonge Dundas Square. The parade will be held along Toronto’s waterfront on July 31st. The festival ends on Sunday August 1st with the DeScotiabank Caribana Lime at Ontario Place.
Even after the Scotiabank Caribana performers have left Vancouver, visitors to the Olympics will see breathtaking images from the annual Toronto festival. Last summer The Canadian Tourism Commission, in association with the Canada’s Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium, sent a film crew right onto the Scotiabank Caribana parade route and shot high definition footage to be used in a video postcard about the Festival.
The Caribana video postcard (one of two dozen made for the Olympics) has been reproduced into four lengths (2.5 minutes, 1 minute, 30 seconds, and 15 seconds), dubbed into several languages, and provided to over 200 official Olympic Games’ broadcasters around the world to be seem by a potential cumulative audience of over 10 billion people.
The Scotiabank Caribana Festival is an exciting two-week cultural explosion of Caribbean music, cuisine, revelry as well as visual and performing arts. Now in its 43rd year, it has become a major international event and the largest cultural festival of its kind in North America. As Scotiabank Caribana is an international cultural phenomenon, the great metropolis of Toronto and its environs will come alive as the city explodes with the pulsating rhythms and melodies of Calypso, Soca, Reggae, Chutney, and Steel Pan music. The Festival Management Committee oversees the running of North America’s largest outdoor festival. www.caribanafestival.com
VANCOUVER TEAM
Ontario Pavilion “CARIBANA”
1. Denise Hererra-Jackson ---- Festival Director
2. Roborta Atkinson ---- Manager
3. Martin Scott-Pascall ---- Artistic Director/Choreographer
4. Tara Eulith Woods ---- Calypsonian
5. Hameed Shaqq ---- Pannist
6. Denise Chang Kit ---- Masquerader/Dancer
7. Lysha DeFreitas ---- Masquerader/Dancer
8. Danielle Edwards ---- Masquerader/Dancer
9. Danielle Ramjattan ---- Masquerader/Dancer
10. Nicki Ramjass ---- Masquerader/Dancer
11. Catrina Ziesman ---- Masquerader/Dancer
12. Sakita Boodhoo ---- Masquerader/Dancer
13. Christiane Tetreault ---- Masquerader/Dancer
Photos by Roberta Atkinson

Arts & Minds feature the Charles Taylor Prize Award luncheon

The Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction

Watch BRAVO! Arts & Minds for reaction and highlights from the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize winner announcement

Coverage can be seen nationally

Saturday, Feb. 13, Sunday, Feb. 14, Tuesday, Feb. 16 & Wednesday, Feb. 17

TORONTO, Feb. 12 /CNW/ - The announcement of the winner of this year's Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction will be the lead item on Bravo's Arts & Minds in coming days. The show will air nationally on BRAVO! at various times a between this Saturday and next Wednesday. Devoted to capturing the suspense and excitement of this national book prize this special edition of Bravo's Arts & Minds will air Saturday, Feb. 13th, Sunday, Feb. 14th as well as on Tuesday, Feb. 16th and Wednesday, Feb. 17th.
Viewers will see highlights of the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction Author Luncheon, which capture the excitement and drama of the event which was held in Toronto on February 8th. The special also includes reaction from prize founder Noreen Taylor and members of the jury.
The Winner of the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is Ian Brown (Toronto) for his book The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Search For His Disabled Son, published by Random House Canada. The $25,000 prize was awarded Monday, February 8, 2010 at Toronto's Le Meridien King Edward Hotel. The remaining CTP finalists - John English, Daniel Poliquin, and Kenneth Whyte - each received $2,000.
Arts & Minds airs on Saturday February 13th at 7:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m; Sunday at 7:00 p.m; Tuesday at 8:30 a.m. and 8:00 p.m and Wednesday at 8:30 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. (All are Eastern Standard Times).
The prestigious Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction recognizes excellence in Canadian non-fiction writing. Since its inception the prize has fostered a growing interest in non-fiction, engaged Canadians in the genre of literary non-fiction, and boosted sales of the winning authors' books.
Founded in commemoration of the late Charles Taylor, one of Canada's foremost essayists and a prominent member of the Canadian literary community, the prize is awarded annually to the author whose book best combines a superb command of the English language, an elegance of style, and a subtlety of thought and perception.
The Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is presented by the Charles Taylor Foundation with the generous support of its partners: Ben McNally Books, Bravo! and Book Television, Canada Newswire (CNW), Event Source, Le Meridien King Edward Hotel, Quill & Quire, The Globe and Mail, and Windfields Farm.
Check www.bravo.ca for the complete listings. This program will also be available online at at: www.bravo.ca/events/CharlesTaylorPrize/ To download high-resolution images of the Charles Taylor Prize winner and finalists, and their shortlisted Book covers please go to: www.thecharlestaylorprize.ca/2010/photogallery_10.asp For more information please visit: www.thecharlestaylorprize.ca, http://www.twitter.com/taylorprize
For further information: Media contact: Stephen Weir & Associates, Stephen Weir: (416) 489-5868, cell: (416) 801-3101, sweir5492@rogers.com; Linda Crane: (905) 257-6033, cell: (416) 727-0112, cranepr@cogeco.ca

Olympic Games Will Heat Up Once Scotiabank Caribana Arrives in Vancouver

Thanks to Scotiabank Caribana
2010 Winter Games are about to feel the Vibe!

As if it wasn't hot enough at the 2010 Vancouver Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games! Today Scotiabank Caribana announced that an all-star cast of Mas Players and world renowned Calypsonian and Pannist will be performing for 3 days at Ontario House, located at 50 Pacific Boulevard at the Concord Place Community Celebration Zone.
Ontario House will showcase the province's tourism, technological, cultural and culinary success stories. As the largest summer festival in the province and the cultural jewel of the country, Scotiabank Caribana will be featured in multimedia presentations at Ontario House, as well as three - one hour performances, one each on February 14th, 15th and
16th.
"We expect over 90,000 people to experience a little bit of Scotiabank Caribana at Ontario House," explained Festival CEO Joe Halstead. " Our performers are energized and Vancouver is really going to feel our Vibe!!!"
The intent of Scotiabank Caribana's participation is to help promote the City of Toronto and the Province of Ontario as a premier tourist destination to visit and do business. It will take the form of a 13-member team showcasing the various carnival arts; Mas', Calypso and Steel pan.
Located in between BC Place Stadium and Sochi House (Science World), Ontario House offers visitors a unique, one-of-a-kind, experience that will live on in their memories for years to come and reinforce Ontario's tourism brand message - "There's No Place Like This..." Ontario House will feature the best Ontario has to offer from a tourism perspective, featuring nightly concerts, culinary experiences, film, technology, the arts and a jaw dropping Scotiabank Caribana performance!
Audiences in Vancouver will get to experience some of the exciting entertainment that makes the 2-week Scotiabank Caribana Festival, Canada's biggest tourist draw -- next to the 2010 Winter Games. This year Scotiabank Caribana is set to kick off Tuesday July 13th at the Yonge Dundas Square. The parade will be held along Toronto's waterfront on July 31st. The festival ends on Sunday August 1st with the DeScotiabank Caribana Lime at Ontario Place.
Even after the Scotiabank Caribana performers have left Vancouver, visitors to the Olympics will see breathtaking images from the annual Toronto festival. Last summer the Canadian Tourism Commission, in association with the Canada's Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium, sent a film crew right onto the Scotiabank Caribana parade route and shot high definition footage to be used in a video postcard about the Festival.
The Caribana video postcard (one of two dozen made for the Olympics) has been reproduced into four lengths (2.5 minutes, 1 minute, 30 seconds, and 15 seconds), dubbed into several languages, and provided to over 200 official (add - 2010) Olympic Games' broadcasters around the world to be seem by a potential cumulative audience of over 10 billion people.
The Scotiabank Caribana Festival is an exciting two-week cultural explosion of Caribbean music, cuisine, revelry as well as visual and performing arts.
Now in its 43rd year, it has become a major international event and the largest cultural festival of its kind in North America. As Scotiabank Caribana is an international cultural phenomenon, the great metropolis of Toronto and its environs will come alive as the city explodes with the pulsating rhythms and melodies of Calypso, Soca, Chutney, and Steel
Pan music. The Festival Management Committee oversees the running of North America's largest outdoor festival. www.caribanafestival.com

- 30 -

Media Contacts:

Stephen Weir
Stephen Weir & Associates
Tel: 416-801-3101 Fax: 416- 488-6518
Email: stephen@stephenweir.com

Time willing Scotiabank Caribana will perform for media in Vancouver. To contact the performers in Vancouver please contact:

Roborta Atkinson | Tour Manager
Festival Management Committee | Scotiabank Caribana
cell: 416-728-8097

Black History Month Exhibition at the Ontario Science Centre thanks to Tourism Toronto

A Black History Month exhibition about the people by the people missed by the people's mainstream media

It wasn't for a lack of trying on the part of Tourism Toronto, the Ontario Science Centre and me (Stephen Weir) that there was a dearth of mainstream media at a special launch of a Black History Month exhibition on Tuesday morning.
Wire Releases. Press Releases. Faxes. Tweets. Facebook postings. Personal Phone calls.The word went out but only the Caribbean Canadian media (Caribbean Camera, Pride, Share, Indo-Caribbean World and CHYRfm), a Chinese Daily newspaper and a Russian / Canadian web TV service came out to take part in the media preview of opening of the special exhibition, "Northern Lights: African- Canadian Stories" curated by Toronto historian Dr. Sheldon Taylor.
What was going on? Tourism Toronto and the Ontario Science Centre are presenting this month a salute to Toronto's rich Black heritage via an exhibition at the Ontario Science Centre. Over 55 artifacts and photos will be on display tracing the region's earliest African-Canadian families back 10 generations.
David Whitaker, President and CEO and Tourism Toronto opened the preview. Speaking to a small group of family members of the Crowley, Newby and Downes families (early African-Canadian Toronto families) and a handful of reporters, Whitaker talked about how Toronto has become a destination for Black travel - various black based US professional conferences will be held in Toronto over the next three years.
This particular exhibition, modest in scope, will not attract tourists to Toronto (it couldn't attract ANY interest from the Toronto Star, Toronto Sun, the Globe and Mail, the National Post, CBC, CTVm CFRB, News 680. Well it is a really long list of people who didn't consider the show opening newsworthy). What it does do is show that Tourism Toronto is willing to support Toronto's black community with funding and marketing/PR support.
The exhibition is located in the Proctor & Gamble Great Hall within the Ontario Science Centre. Visitors flocking to see the popular Body Worlds 3 touring exhibition will pass right past the "Northern Lights: African- Canadian Stories" - so the show will get more eyes now that the show is open than the mainstream media got during the Tuesday launch.

CUTLINE: Two cameras capture the opening of a new Black History Month exhibition. From left to right: Arthur Downes (standing in front of a picture of himself taken when he was a young man), Science Centre head Lesley Lewis, Curator Dr. Sheldon Taylor, David Whitaker (CEO Tourism Toronto), David Oglivie (chair of Tourism Toronto board)

Award winning reporter Ron Fanfair covered the opening of the "Northern Lights: African- Canadian Stories"exhibtion.

Globe and Mail Columnist and Author Ian Brown Wins Big

Ian Brown Wins the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction

The Winner of the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is Ian Brown (Toronto) for his book The Boy in the Moon: A Father’s Search For His Disabled Son, published by Random House Canada. The $25,000 prize was awarded Monday, February 8, 2010, at a gala luncheon held in the historic Sovereign Ballroom of downtown Toronto’s Le Meridien King Edward Hotel. The remaining nominees — John English, Daniel Poliquin, and Kenneth Whyte — each received $2,000.
Of the book, the jury said: “In telling the story of his son afflicted with a rare, mysterious disease, Ian Brown takes us into a netherworld where medicine and morality meet. He recounts the quotidian struggles of Walker with artless candour, quirky humour and unsparing detail. Marshalling a journalist’s investigative tools, Brown searches out the disabled and finds not only them, but a community of geneticists, neurologists, ethicists, and secular saints. His account of his journey is deeply discomfiting and deeply affecting. Along the way, Brown discovers himself — and the capacity for love.”
Ian Brown is a feature writer for The Globe and Mail; the anchor of TVO’s Human Edge and The View from Here, Canada’s television documentary series; and for 10 years was the host of CBC Radio One’s Talking Books. His reporting and writing have won more than a dozen national magazine and newspaper awards. He is the author of two books, Freewheeling and Man Overboard, and the editor of the anthology What I Meant to Say: The Private Lives of Men. He lives in Toronto, Ontario.
The jurors for The 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction are Andrew Cohen (Toronto), Tim Cook (Ottawa), and Sheila Fischman (Montréal). They selected The Boy in the Moon: A Father’s Search For His Disabled Son from among 125 books, submitted by 34 publishers, from all across North America. Books in the genre of literary non-fiction, published between November 1, 2008, and October 31, 2009, were eligible for submission if authored by a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, and widely available for purchase in Canada.
The prestigious Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction recognizes excellence in Canadian non-fiction writing. Since its inception in 1998, the prize has fostered a growing interest in non-fiction, engaged Canadians in the genre of literary non-fiction, and boosted sales of the winning authors’ books.
Founded in commemoration of the late Charles Taylor, one of Canada’s foremost essayists and a prominent member of the Canadian literary community, the prize is awarded annually to the author whose book best combines a superb command of the English language, an elegance of style, and a subtlety of thought and perception.
The trustees of the Charles Taylor Foundation are Michael Bradley (Toronto), Judith Mappin (Montréal), David Staines (Ottawa), and Noreen Taylor (Toronto). The Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction is presented by the Charles Taylor Foundation with the generous support of its partners: Ben McNally Books, Bravo! and Book Television, Canada Newswire (CNW), Event Source, Indigo Books and Music, Le Meridien King Edward Hotel, Quill & Quire, The Globe and Mail, and Windfields Farm.

Bravo! Arts&Minds Charles Taylor Prize Special

This special edition of Arts&Minds will feature highlights of the 2010 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction shortlist news conference and awards luncheon, and a feature interview with the winner. The special also includes reaction from prize founder Noreen Taylor and members of the jury, as well as profiles of each of the shortlisted authors and their books. The show will premiere on Saturday, February 20th at 6:00 p.m. Eastern and Sunday, February 21st at 7:00 p.m. Eastern. Check www.bravo.ca for the complete listings. This program will also be available online at www.bravo.ca/events/CharlesTaylorPrize/
To download high-resolution images of the jury, finalists, and shortlisted Book covers please go to: www.thecharlestaylorprize.ca/2010/photogallery_10.asp
For more information please visit: www.thecharlestaylorprize.ca and follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/taylorprize

PHOTO CUTLINE: Noreen Taylor, founder of the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction congratulates Ian Brown, winner of the 2010 prize for his book The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Search for his Disabled Son. (CNW Group/Charles Taylor Prize)

Media contact: Stephen Weir & Associates
Stephen Weir: 416-489-5868 cell: 416-801-3101 sweir5492@rogers.com
Linda Crane: 905-257-6033 cell: 416-727-0112 cranepr@cogeco.ca