Ray Bay ######## Jacksonville Festival Season Opens wi

Saturday, March 18th marked the beginning of the Jax Beach ’06 festival season with the 16th Annual Great Atlantic Seafood and Music Festival. After a beautiful week of temps in the upper 70’s, Saturday saw a shift in winds from the North East, dropping temperatures into the upper 60’s. Not to matter, the sunny skies brought the masses out in droves to the Seawalk Pavilion for a day of music fun and food.
At center stage, people were dancing to the music from 12 to 10 with a variety of live bands playing everything from funk to rap, blues Ray Bay ########, jazz, and just good ole rock and roll. Fusebox Funk delighted festival goers with their own style of rap and funk, and then went over to Freebird Live to do another set that night. Another Jacksonville favorite ######## Ray Bays Sunglasses Fishing With Fly Fishing, Woody and the Peckers performed a set of old and new rock, belting out favorites such as Beatle’s tune I Saw Her Standing There, and I Got a Line on You by Spirit. Young and old alike laid out and frolicked on the grass all day long enjoying tunes from every genre.
Over at the Food Court, the star of the show was the massive amounts of fresh Florida seafood. Grouper, Mahi, shrimp, crawfish and calamari - prepared in a variety of ways from Cajun to Greek, to just plain old Florida style cookin’. Something for everybody, even the non seafood lovers could enjoy the Florida Bar-B-Q at the Sticky Fingers booth. Long lines of hungry festival goers couldn’t seem to get enough of the bountiful Florida fruit of the sea!
Fun for all ages, the playground area across from the food court had a really fun bunji jumping ride and a very tall rock climbing wall for the adventurers. In the other corner were the inflatables just for the toddlers, with Superman standing guard.
Making your way back to the stage was also a treat, with booths lined up four wide and manned by vendors from all over Florida and the Caribbean. Arts and crafts of all kinds from handcrafted wood carvings of fish and other animals, to the colorful Reggae fashions from Jamaica. Jewelry, T-shirts, sunglasses from Ocean Wave, and all kinds of ornaments and unusual stuff filled the booths all the way back to First Street.
A great way to start the spring, the Great Atlantic Seafood and Music Festival was once again a huge success.
Coming up on the first weekend in April at the Seawalk Pavilion is the mother of all beaches festivals. Three days of music, food and fun, the 16th Annual George’s Music Springing the Blues Festival starts on March 31st. Blues bands from all over the country
perform to the delight of 40,000+ festival goers. Other events at the three day festival include a 5k run, a surfing contest, and a bike ride for cancer research, as well as some after hours jam sessions in some local clubs.
The oceanfront Seawalk Pavilion in Jacksonville Beach is a two block area where people come to lay out and play in the grass. Events are scheduled throughout the year including festivals, live concerts, and a moonlight movie series during the summer months. A destination for the people of Jacksonville and the Beaches, visitors to our area should definitely put one of these events on their list of things to do!
While working with Paul McCartney on the two hit singles "The Girl Is Mine" (1982) and "Say Say Say" (1983), the pair became friendly. McCartney told Jackson about the large amount of money he earned from owning music catalogs; he was earning approximately $40 million a year from other people's songs. Jackson subsequently began buying, selling, and distributing publishing rights to music from numerous artists. In 1985, ATV Music, a music publishing company owning thousands of music copyrights, including the Northern Songs catalog that contained the majority of the Lennon-McCartney compositions recorded by the Beatles, was put up for sale. Jackson took an immediate interest in the catalog, but was warned he would face strong competition. Excited, he skipped around saying, "I don't care. I want those songs. Get me those songs Branca [his attorney]". Branca contacted McCartney's attorney, who clarified that his client was not interested in bidding: "It's too pricey". After Jackson had started negotiations, McCartney changed his mind and tried to persuade Yoko Ono to join him in a joint bid, but she declined, so he pulled out. Jackson eventually beat the rest of the competition in negotiations that lasted 10 months, purchasing the catalog for $47.5 million.
On May 14, 1984, he was invited to the White House to receive an award from President Ronald Reagan for his support of charities that helped people overcome alcohol and drug abuse. Jackson won eight awards during the Grammys that year. Unlike later albums, Thriller did not have an official tour to promote it, but the 1984 Victory Tour, headlined by The Jacksons, showcased much of Jackson's new solo material to more than two million Americans. He donated his $5 million share from the Victory Tour to charity. He also co-wrote the charity single "We Are the World" in 1985 with Lionel Richie, which was released worldwide to aid the poor in the U.S. and Africa. It became one of the best-selling singles of all time, with nearly 20 million copies sold and millions of dollars donated to famine relief.