Michael

Michael /ˈmaɪkəl/ is a male given name that comes from the Hebrew: מִיכָאֵל / מיכאל‎ (Mīkhāʼēl, pronounced [miχaˈʔel]), derived from the question מי כאל mī kāʼēl, meaning "Who is like God?" (literally, "Who is like El?). In English, it is sometimes shortened to Mike, Mikey, Mickey, or Mick.

Female forms of Michael include Michelle, Michele, Michaela, Mechelle, Micheline, and Michaelle, although Michael is occasionally seen as a female name; women named Michael include actresses Michael Learned and Michael Michele. Another form is Mychal, which can either be a male or female name.

Patronymic surnames that come from Michael include Michaels, Carmichael, MacMichael, McMichael, Micallef, Michaelson, Mikkelsen, DiMichele, Mikhaylov, Mykhaylenko, Mikeladze, Michels, and Mitchell.

Religion

The name first appears in the Hebrew Bible in the Book of Numbers, 13:13 where Sethur the son of Michael is one of 12 spies sent into the Land of Canaan. The archangel Michael features in the Book of Daniel 12:1, and in the Qur'an as Mikhail.

Hellmut Lange

Hellmut Lange (19 January 1923 – 13 January 2011) was an actor and journalist who became famous as action hero on TV and eventually succeeded as presenter of his popular TV show "Kennen Sie Kino?" ("Are you a cinema connoisseur?")

First engagements

Hellmut Lange started his acting career on radio drama shows for the West-German Radio Station SFB (Sender Freies Berlin= Radio Free Berlin). After finishing his school formation he studied acting for two years in Hanover and then he worked as a stage actor in Munich. In the early fifties he played Old Shatterhand on an open air stage.

On the screen

In 1961 he was the principal actor in a German Edgar Wallace adaption for cinema. The next year he had one of the main roles in a TV mini series based on a story of Francis Durbridge. He also acted as the protagonist of the TV series John Kling. Since he had already played Old Shatterhand, a hero which has evidently been inspired by James Fenimore Cooper's Natty Bumppo, it didn't come as a surprise that he was considered an appropriate choice for acting as Natty Bumppo himself. That he did with tremendous success in a German TV mini series called after the "leatherstocking ("Lederstrumpf") tales". This TV series which starred a Frenchman (Pierre Massimi) as Chingachgook was in many ways the predecessor of the also very successful Karl May films in which Lex Barker (or sometimes Stewart Granger) would team up with the French actor Pierre Brice as Winnetou (note: This cannot be true regarding that the Karl May Western films had been released between 1962 and 1968 while the "Lederstrumpf tales" were produced in 1969, HG). Lange himself didn't play Winnetou's friend Old Shatterhand again. Instead he appeared in a Hollywood picture about General Patton and was also the German voice of Richard Harris, Charlton Heston, Paul Newman and other American stars for the German dubbed versions of some of their feature films.

Pikachu

Pikachu (Japanese: ピカチュウ) are a species of Pokémon, fictional creatures that appear in an assortment of video games, animated television shows and movies, trading card games, and comic books licensed by The Pokémon Company, a Japanese corporation. The Pikachu design was conceived by Ken Sugimori. Pikachu first appeared in Pokémon Red and Green in Japan, and later in the first internationally released Pokémon video games, Pokémon Red and Blue, for the original Game Boy.

Like other species of Pokémon, Pikachu are often captured and groomed by humans to fight other Pokémon for sport. Pikachu are one of the most well-known varieties of Pokémon, largely because a Pikachu is a central character in the Pokémon anime series. Pikachu is regarded as a major character of the Pokémon franchise as well as its mascot, and has become an icon of Japanese pop culture in recent years.

Concept and design

Developed by Game Freak and published by Nintendo, the Pokémon series began in Japan in 1996, and features several species of creatures called "Pokémon" that players, called "trainers", are encouraged to capture, train, and use to battle other players' Pokémon or interact with the game's world. Pikachu was one of several different Pokémon designs conceived by Game Freak's character development team and finalized by artist Ken Sugimori. According to series producer Satoshi Tajiri, the name is derived from a combination of two Japanese sounds: pika, a sound an electric spark makes, and chu, a sound a mouse makes. Developer Junichi Masuda noted Pikachu's name as one of the most difficult to create, due to an effort to make it appealing to both Japanese and American audiences.

In the Pits

In the Pits is a situation comedy produced by The Backlight Theatre Group! Inc. in Jacksonville, Florida.

It is broadcast on WCWJ by the Nexstargroup, an affiliate of The CW.

CW17 began airing In The Pits on September 25 at 9:00pm. In The Pits is an original and locally–written, –cast, –staged, –shot and –edited sitcom produced by Jacksonville-based BackLight Theatre Group, Inc.

In the Pits is a dramatic comedy about a Stage Group named the Parafloramore Theatre Company that in the Great Recession falls into hard times and the lengths that its eccentric group of staff and board members will go to keep the company afloat.

Cast

Singing

Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of tonality, rhythm, the use of sustained tones and a variety of vocal techniques. A person who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung without accompaniment or with accompaniment by musical instruments. Singing is often done in a group of other musicians, such as in a choir of singers with different voice ranges, or in an ensemble with instrumentalists, such as a rock group or baroque ensemble. Singers may also perform as soloist with accompaniment from a piano (as in art song and in some jazz styles) or with a symphony orchestra or big band. There are a range of different singing styles, including art music styles such as opera and Chinese opera, religious music styles such as Gospel, traditional music styles, world music, jazz, blues and popular music styles such as pop and rock.

Singing can be formal or informal, arranged or improvised. It may be done for religious devotion, as a hobby, as a source of pleasure, comfort, or ritual, as part of music education, or as a profession. Excellence in singing requires time, dedication, instruction, and regular practice. If practice is done on a regular basis then the sounds can become more clear and strong. Professional singers usually build their careers around one specific musical genre, such as classical or rock, although there are singers with crossover success (singing in more than one genre). They typically take voice training provided by voice teachers or vocal coaches throughout their careers.