Company Musical

It's among "the most revered and the least revived" of musicals, remarked Angela Lansbury. She was referring to "Company," the legendary 1970 show about a bachelor named Bobby and the company he keeps. Lansbury welcomed a crowd of more than 3,100 "Company" fans to a one-night, concert-style rendition of the score, sung by most of the original cast at the Terrace Theater in Long Beach on Saturday.

Google Inc., which is developing a digital music service, is winning over record companies that are hoping the technology company can loosen Apple Inc.'s grip on the digital music market. The talks center on securing a sweeping set of licenses that would give Google the latitude to offer an array of products and services through its Android operating system for mobile phones as well as through computer browsers, said executives familiar with the discussions. Music companies have all but rolled out the red carpet for Google, believing that the Mountain View, Calif.

Time Warner's Warner Music Group has been rocked by executive exodus, controversies and other tumult in the past year. Some highlights: July, 1994: Elektra Entertainment Chairman Robert Krasnow, a 13-year Warner Atlantic veteran, quits the day after Warner Music Group Chairman Robert Morgado announces a new chain of command. August, 1994: Following a corporate battle with Morgado, Mo Ostin, who ran Warner Bros.

The i's have it: Intel and iPod helped drive quarterly sales and profit up sharply at Apple Computer Inc. as the company continued to dominate portable entertainment and gained traction against rival computer makers. Apple's shift this year to chips made by Intel Corp. boosted sales of Macintosh computers to their highest level since the 1999 holiday season. Sales were also helped by a broader shift in the PC industry away from corporate buyers and toward average people.

Music Theatre of Southern California, which presented musicals at San Gabriel Civic Auditorium for more than 17 years, is ceasing operations. Known as San Gabriel Valley Civic Light Opera until 1994, the company expanded to the Alex Theatre in Glendale in 1998, presenting the first three weekends of each run in San Gabriel and the final weekend in Glendale.

A North Carolina toy maker is recalling more than 40,000 musical crib mobiles that have parts that may pose a choking hazard to small children, the Consumer Product Safety Commission announced Monday. The toys affected by the voluntary recall are the Musical Mother Goose Mobile and Musical Carousel Crib Mobile, imported and distributed by Stahlwood Toy Manufacturing Co. Inc. of Youngsville, N.C.

The i's have it: Intel and iPod helped drive quarterly sales and profit up sharply at Apple Computer Inc. as the company continued to dominate portable entertainment and gained traction against rival computer makers. Apple's shift this year to chips made by Intel Corp. boosted sales of Macintosh computers to their highest level since the 1999 holiday season. Sales were also helped by a broader shift in the PC industry away from corporate buyers and toward average people.

In the latest twist in the corporate uproar at Warner Music Group, another of the firm's ousted top record executives is expected to file a $15-million breach-of-contract suit today against the nation's largest music conglomerate. Melvyn R. Lewinter, former president and chief operating officer of Time Warner's domestic music division, was abruptly fired Wednesday--exactly five weeks after his boss Doug Morris got the boot.

Erin Bacon, marketing and communications coordinator of the Epcor Centre for the Performing Arts in Calgary, Canada, flew in to get tips on landing corporate sponsorships. Tom Kaiden, chief operating officer of the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance, brought about 30 people from his 300 nonprofit member organizations because "it's cheaper and more cost-efficient for us to bring 30 people to Los Angeles than to bring all the speakers to Philadelphia."

After a tumultuous 15 months, Opera Pacific general director Patrick L. Veitch said Wednesday that he has left Orange County's only professional opera company. "At this point, I don't have anything to say, other than verifying that I'm not there," Veitch said Wednesday from his home near Newport Beach. His one-year contract had expired in August, but Veitch said in an interview earlier this fall that he expected it to be renewed by the opera's board of directors without dissent.

Erin Bacon, marketing and communications coordinator of the Epcor Centre for the Performing Arts in Calgary, Canada, flew in to get tips on landing corporate sponsorships. Tom Kaiden, chief operating officer of the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance, brought about 30 people from his 300 nonprofit member organizations because "it's cheaper and more cost-efficient for us to bring 30 people to Los Angeles than to bring all the speakers to Philadelphia."

On an overcast December day, Saddam Hussein's capture has just been announced. The comic opportunities intrigue Matt Walker. "We've got to work Saddam in there somehow," he says backstage at the Falcon Theatre in Burbank as he prepares for a matinee of "It's a Stevie Wonderful Life." It's a raucous spoof of "It's a Wonderful Life" that uses tunes from the Stevie Wonder songbook, with somewhat changed lyrics. Walker is the show's director as well as one of the writers.

Picture President Bush jetting in Air Force One toward tense meetings with Asian leaders and keeping tabs on the Middle East. Then imagine the weary commander in chief, looking for a musical respite, pulling on the headset at his seat and hearing ... "Last Stand in Open Country" by Willie Nelson and Kid Rock?

Music Theatre of Southern California, which presented musicals at San Gabriel Civic Auditorium for more than 17 years, is ceasing operations. Known as San Gabriel Valley Civic Light Opera until 1994, the company expanded to the Alex Theatre in Glendale in 1998, presenting the first three weekends of each run in San Gabriel and the final weekend in Glendale.

Napster Inc. proved that tens of millions of consumers would flock to an online file-sharing service that let them copy music for free. Now, with Napster scrambling to avoid a potentially crippling injunction for copyright violations, several upstart file-sharing networks are preparing to test whether consumers will pay for the privilege. These companies--including Britain-based Wippit, CenterSpan Communications Corp.

Aspiring rockers daydream about a record-company talent scout walking into a nightclub and discovering them. For Transmatic, that moment of discovery came not in a smoky, deafening bar, but in cyberspace. The rock band recently signed a multimillion-dollar, six-record deal with Virgin Immortal Records, according to its management. Transmatic owes its contract in part to Loudenergy.

Record industry veteran Gary Gersh will reenter the music business today with the launch of an Internet record company called DEN Music Group. Gersh and his partner, rock manager John Silva, have signed four-year, multimillion-dollar contracts to become co-presidents of the cybermusic start-up, which is a subsidiary of Digital Entertainment Network Inc., a Santa Monica company that creates and streams youth-oriented shows on the Internet.

After a tumultuous 15 months, Opera Pacific general director Patrick L. Veitch said Wednesday that he has left Orange County's only professional opera company. "At this point, I don't have anything to say, other than verifying that I'm not there," Veitch said Wednesday from his home near Newport Beach. His one-year contract had expired in August, but Veitch said in an interview earlier this fall that he expected it to be renewed by the opera's board of directors without dissent.