Wow, sorry to hear about Patrick. I did not know him, but it seems pretty obvious that he touched some lives. My condolences to everyone that knew him and his family.

On a brighter note, this weekend my brother Sevan rolled into Boston from Chicago (soon to be Milwaukee, Wisconsin) for the Sarine Gregorian wedding. It was good to see him as I get to hang out with him about once per year. A bunch of us went to Boston Billiards near Fenway Park on Friday night and had a great time.

Earlier that day, I heard some great news on several CD projects that are in play. Filmmaker Atom Egoyan emailed me an endorsement on "Armenian Voices" that will show up in the banner up where Gor's is now. I never thought he would respond after sending him the CD and some info, but he did and shows that he is a class act and is a music lover. Also, just before I headed out to the pool hall, I received notice that Gor's "Yeraz" has been nominated for another music awards ceremony. It's called the Just Plain Folks awards and "Yeraz" the album was nominated as Best World Music Album and "Yeraz" the song was nominated as "Best World Music Song". The awards show is in L.A. sometime in February 2003. Needless to say, Friday was a pretty exciting day.

It looks like there will be a decent size Pomegranate Music cheering section at the Armenian Music Awards in Glendale on November 24, 2002. While Gor's status is still up in the air as to whether he can attend (U.S. Embassy Visa issues), Aaron Stayman (guitarist on "yeraz") will be attending, so will designer Arsineh Khachikian and about 10 of our friends. Since it's my first AMA, I don't know what to expect. From what I've seen from last years show on video, it looks like a professionally run event with a very competant orgainzer in Peter Bahlawanian. The website is www.armenianmusicawards.com in case anyone wants to come out and check out the show...