title: Teacher education

text: But the key duality of identity that lies at the core of the teacher educator profession is that of first-order and second order teaching. A teacher educator must be a highly competent ‘first-order educator’ (i.e. a good teacher) but also a skilled ‘second-order educator’ (i.e. capable of teaching effectively about the skill of teaching and facilitating others to acquire teaching skills). As first-order educators, they need to be proficient teachers (of 'adult' students). As second-order educators, they require, in addition, specific competences and dispositions, such as modelling and meta-reflection, that enable them to teach about teaching.


title: Teacher education

text: The acquisition or improvement of teacher competences requires training, through which it will be improved educational planning and assessment. This results in a better learning of students, as evidences show. It is the objective of FAMT & L Comenius project, conducted at the University of Bologna, designed with the aim of promoting the correct use of formative assessment in mathematics education for students aged from 11 to 16. Reaching this goal supposes to design training programs for teachers of mathematics, starting from identifying their needs, believes, expectations and the use of formative assessment.


title: Teacher education

text: The way in which teacher educators teach has a greater impact on student teachers’ thinking about practice than what teacher educators teach. So, teacher educators need to be able to model the competences and attributes they wish their students to adopt. Swennen et al. (2008). concluded that, in order to ‘model’ what they teach, teacher educators need to develop the ability to link their own (tacit) theories and practice of teaching to public theory, i.e., in Korthagen’s words, to translate Theory with a capital ‘T’ to theory with a small ‘t’.


title: Teacher education

text: Just as teaching is no longer seen as simply transferring factual information, so educating teachers also requires a more sophisticated approach, based upon professional awareness that comes from reflective practice. For Loughran, being a professional teacher educator requires “genuinely reflecting on, and responding to, the needs, demands, and expectations of teaching about teaching within the academy”.


title: Teacher education

text: In some parts of the world (notably the United States, Flanders and the Netherlands) specific standards of professional practice have been developed for, or by, teacher educators. These set out the range of competences that a member of the teacher educator profession is expected to be able to deploy, as well as the attitudes, values and behaviours that are deemed to be acceptable for membership of the profession).


title: Teacher education

text: While schools and school teachers are often in the news and in political debate, research shows that the teacher educator profession is largely absent from such public discussions and from policy discourse in Education which often focuses exclusively on teachers and school leaders.


title: Teacher education

text: Some research suggests that, while most countries have policies, and legislation, in place concerning the teaching profession, few countries have a clear policy or strategy on the teacher educator profession. Caena (2012) found that some of the consequences of this situation can include a teacher educator profession that is poorly organised, has low status or low formal recognition, has few regulations, professional standards – or even minimum qualifications, and no coherent approach to the selection, induction, or continuing professional development of Teacher Educators.


title: Teacher education

text: In India, the National Council of Teacher Education (NCTE) released the 'National Curricular Framework for Teacher Education, 2010 (NCFTE), which aims to remedy many of the ills of teacher training in India. It calls for preparing a 'humane and reflective practitioner' and for fostering the agency and autonomy of the teacher, who can interpret the curriculum meaningfully to the contextual needs of the learners, than merely focus on 'teaching the text book'.


title: Teacher education

text: The teacher educator profession has also been seen as under-researched; empirical research on professional practice is also scarce.


title: Teacher education

text: However, the importance of the quality of this profession for the quality of teaching and learning has been underlined by international bodies including the OECD and the European Commission.


title: Teacher education

text: Some writers have therefore identified a need for more research into "what teachers of teachers themselves need to know", and what institutional supports are needed to "meet the complex demands of preparing teachers for the 21st century".


title: Teacher education

text: In response to this perceived need, more research projects are now focussing on the teacher educator profession. Several academic journals cover this field.


title: Love and Redemption

text: Love and Redemption () is a 2020 Chinese television series based on the novel "Liu Li Mei Ren Sha" () by Shi Si Lang (). It premiered on Youku and Mango TV on August 6, 2020. It stars actors Cheng Yi as Yu Sifeng and Yuan Bingyan as Chu Xuanji.


title: Love and Redemption

text: A 1000 years ago, a bitter battle ensues between the Celestials and the Asuras in a struggle for power. The General of the Asura Clan, The Star of Mosha, is defeated by the God of War. He disappears and his soul is sealed in a crystal lamp, which is then sent to the mortal realm to be hidden. However, the God of War too, mysteriously vanishes along with him. A 1000 years later, both of their souls are sent to the mortal realm to undergo tribulation and the demonic realm begins to prepare the revive the Star of Mosha.


title: Love and Redemption

text: In the mortal realm, Chu Xuanji (Yuan Bingyan) is born to the Shaoyang Sect Leader without the power of perception through all 6 senses. She meets Yu Sifeng (Cheng Yi), a skilled disciple of the mysterious Lize Palace, during the Flower Banquet being held at Shaoyang.


title: Love and Redemption

text: A turn of events leads to Xuanji being injured during the banquet and she leaves to cultivate and train herself for four years. Sifeng returns to Lize Palace, where he is punished for breaking the sect rules with the Lover's Curse.


title: Love and Redemption

text: They encounter each other, years later and set off for their own adventures, but their journey is riddled with mysterious encounters and they start to realize that there is more to their past than they thought as a millennium-old conspiracy slowly comes to light.


title: International Phonetic Alphabet chart for English dialects

text: This chart shows the most common applications of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to represent English language pronunciations.


text: This chart gives a partial system of diaphonemes for English. The symbols for the diaphonemes are given in bold, followed by their most common phonetic values. For the vowels, a separate phonetic value is given for each major dialect, and words used to name corresponding lexical sets are also given. The diaphonemes and lexical sets given here are based on RP and General American; they are not sufficient to express all of the distinctions found in other dialects, such as Australian English.


title: Pac-Man World

text: The game originally began as an open-world adventure game titled "Pac-Man Ghost Zone", with development headed by director Bill Anderson and designer Scott Rogers. After being unhappy with the game's quality, Namco scrapped the game and fired nearly the entire team aside from Rogers and a few others. The development team focused on making the game live up to the "flavor and feel" of the original "Pac-Man", and to successfully bring the character into an enjoyable 3D adventure game.


title: Pac-Man World

text: "Pac-Man World" was a critical and commercial success, selling over 1.25 million copies in North America alone. Reviewers praised the game's originality, colorful graphics, gameplay mechanics, and soundtrack. Some criticized it for being repetitive after a while and its constant use of backtracking. A Game Boy Advance remake was developed by Full Fat and released in 2004, while the PlayStation version was digitally re-released for the PlayStation Network in 2013 under the PSone Classics brand. It was followed by two sequels, "Pac-Man World 2" and "Pac-Man World 3", and a racing spin-off, "Pac-Man World Rally". A remake developed by Now Production and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment, titled Pac-Man World Re-Pac, was released on August 26, 2022 on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and Windows.


title: Pac-Man World

text: "Pac-Man World" is a 3D platform video game. Controlling Pac-Man, the player must complete each of the game's six worlds to rescue his family and friends, who are held captive by the ghosts in their homeland of Ghost Island. Worlds consist of four levels each (except the Ruins world, which has three), which are completed by eating all of the pellets to open up an exit door. The final level of each world has a boss that Pac-Man must defeat in order to progress. At the beginning of the game, only three worlds are available, while the other three are unlocked by completing all prior worlds. The six worlds in the game each feature distinctive themes, e.g. the first world, Pirate, features ships, cannons, and beaches.


title: Pac-Man World

text: Levels contain fruit that can be eaten for bonus points, alongside letters that spell out "PACMAN". Collecting all of these letters in a level will unlock a secret bonus stage. Some levels require Pac-Man to retrieve a key to rescue one of his captive friends. "Galaxian" flagships found in certain levels allow Pac-Man to access a 3D maze themed after the world he is in. These mazes play similarly to the original "Pac-Man" and "Ms. Pac-Man", where Pac-Man will need to eat all the dots and avoid the ghosts. Completing these mazes will unlock them for replay from the main menu. Most levels also contain Pac-Man's nemeses, the ghost gang, which can be defeated by consuming large Power Pellets and eating them.


title: Pac-Man World

text: Pac-Man has two main moves, which can be used to defeat enemies and other objects: a butt-bounce that can shatter crates and crush enemies, and a rev-roll that allows him to propel up ramps or activate moving platforms. Pac-Man has a health meter that allows him to sustain three hits before dying. He can find small fractions of health to replenish it in levels, as well as extra lives. The player can find crates scattered around in levels, some of them giving Pac-Man access to new abilities, such as a metal suit allowing him to walk underwater. Pac-Man can also interact with objects such as trampolines, doors and ramps, which can be used to solve puzzles to progress through the level. At the main menu, the player can play a port of the original "Pac-Man" arcade game, which is the same version found in "Namco Museum Vol. 1".


title: Pac-Man World

text: "Pac-Man World" began as a prototype platform game for the PlayStation, titled "Pac-Man Ghost Zone", which was only shown at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 1997 and intended for released in the fall of that same year. Headed by Namco Hometek director Bill Anderson, the game followed a teenager being sucked into a "Pac-Man" arcade cabinet by the ghosts and their leader the Ghostlord, and transforming into Pac-Man. The game was made to break the mold of previous "Pac-Man" games, such as having a grittier look. Namco's Japanese division put pressure on the project with strict guidelines — Anderson recalls being unable to use a 3D render of the character as a reference, requiring the team to make it themselves. Development was assisted by designer Scott Rogers, with music composed by Tommy Tallarico. When the prototype was presented to Namco, they became unhappy with it and cancelled it for quality reasons, firing the entire development team aside from Rogers, an artist and a programmer. Namco also pushed the release date back to 1998 to allow the game to be reworked. The team decided to revamp the project with a new gameplay engine.


title: Pac-Man World

text: Rogers, who had previously worked on localization for Namco's own "Soul Edge" and "Xevious 3D/G", became the head designer of the project and created many of the enemies and stage layouts. The team set out to retain the "flavor and feel" of the original "Pac-Man", and to bring the character into an entertaining platform game. Inspiration was taken from earlier platform games in the series, notably "Pac-Land" (1984) and "Pac-In-Time" (1995). During development, Rogers noted that trying to live up to the game's source material put a large amount of pressure on the team, claiming that most players were only familiar with the original "Pac-Man" and "Ms. Pac-Man" with no memories for later games in the series, which left the team having to make the game appeal to players of those two games. The game originally featured cameos from other Namco characters, including Taizo Hori from "Dig Dug" and Valkyrie from "Valkyrie no Densetsu", however these were replaced with members of Pac-Man's family in the final version — a Pooka from "Dig Dug" was later added into the game due to the character's popularity in Japan. The game's main antagonist, Toc-Man, is named after Namcot, the older Japanese home console division of Namco.


title: Pac-Man World

text: Pac-Man wasn't given a voice in the game due to Namco being unable to decide what he should sound like — some suggested that he sound like an adult male and others like a human child. To save money on voice acting and animation, the character was left largely unvoiced with no lines spoken. Tommy Tallarico's studio was hired back for the game's audio, with Joey Kuras being responsible for the sound design and Todd Dennis composing the music. The game was first shown at the 1998 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) tradeshow in Atlanta, Georgia, under the working title "Pac-Man 3-D". Rogers recalls it being a popular title, saying that many play testers shared with him their memories with "Pac-Man" series. It was then shown off at E3 1999 under the final title of "Pac-Man World: 20th Anniversary". The game was released in North America on October 15, 1999, to coincide with the original release of "Pac-Man" in the United States. The advertisements notably featured Mr. T and Verne Troyer as neighbors in Beverly Hills who are shocked to see Pac-Man move into and renovate the house across the street from them. It was later released in Japan on November 2, 1999 and in Europe on February 28, 2000. A Game Boy Advance version was developed by Full Fat and released in 2004. The PlayStation version was digitally re-released on the PlayStation Network in 2013, part of the PSone Classics brand.


title: Pac-Man World

text: "Pac-Man World" was well received by critics for its gameplay, soundtrack, graphics and originality, holding an 81% score on aggregator website "GameRankings" trough the GBA version hold a score of 59.00%. By 2007, the game had sold over 1.24 million copies in North America alone.


title: Pac-Man World

text: "GameSpot" compared the game favorably to Namco's own "", praising its colorful graphics, character animations and controls, concluding that it was "worthy of anyone's library". "IGN" had a similar response, liking the game's originality, graphics and soundtrack — they especially praised its gameplay for standing out among other platform games, with its puzzle solving and animation style. "GameFan" praised its gameplay, puzzle-solving mechanics and inclusion of the original "Pac-Man", while "Official US PlayStation Magazine" applauded its gameplay, vibrant graphics, challenge and boss fights, saying that the game's use of nostalgia doesn't feel forced on the player. "GameFan" also wrote that the game "perfectly mimics those old 8-bit and 16-bit platformers we used to go nuts over", comparing the game's quality favorably to "Klonoa: Door to Phantomile". "Atari HQ" liked how the game tied in a platform game with mechanics from the original, highly praising its gameplay and originality.


title: Pac-Man World

text: "Game Revolution" was particularly negative towards the game, saying that it simply existed as a marketing ploy to scoop up additional money from the name recognition. They criticized the game for lacking originality, particularly comparing it unfavorably to "Donkey Kong Country" and "Crash Bandicoot", as well as for having an unbalanced difficulty level and "quick, corner-cutting development". They only recommended the game to hardcore "Pac-Man" fans, although mockingly commented that they "probably bought [it] already."


title: Pac-Man World

text: A remake of "Pac-Man World", titled Pac-Man World Re-Pac, was announced through a Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase in June 2022. Developed by Now Production, using the Unity engine, the game recreates the game from the ground up. The remake was released on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X and Series S, and PC via Steam on August 26 the same year. Unlike prior releases in this console generation ("Katamari", "Mr. Driller", "Klonoa"), it is not a part of Namco's "Encore" series of 3D franchise remakes.


title: Pac-Man World

text: "Pac-Man World Re-Pac" features several alterations to the game, ranging from visual overhauls to several worlds and alterations to gameplay. Various stages have been altered from their original counterparts, as well as boss battles being overhauled and new enemies being added. The remake also introduces several new techniques for Pac-Man, such as being able to destroy level objects after eating a Power Pellet, and Pac-Man being able to hover in the air. Several members of Pac-Man's family, notably Ms. Pac-Man and Pac-Baby (who now appear as Pac-Mom and Pac-Sis respectively), were redesigned and renamed, similar to previous Pac-Man re-releases including "Pac-Man Museum +". While not officially clarified why the changes were made, it is assumed to be tied to Ms. Pac-Man's ongoing AtGames dispute.


title: Pac-Man World

text: Paid DLC was added to the game that gives Pac-Man a special skin and also unlocks a jukebox to listen to the game's music.


title: Blind (poker)

text: Blinds are forced bets posted by players to the left of the dealer button in flop-style poker games. The number of blinds is usually two, but it can range from none to three.


title: Blind (poker)

text: The "small blind" is placed by the player to the left of the dealer button and the "big blind" is then posted by the next player to the left. The one exception is when there are only two players (a "heads-up" game), when the player on the button is the small blind, and the other player is the big blind. (Both the player and the bet may be referred to as big or small blind.)


title: Blind (poker)

text: After the cards are dealt, the player to the left of the big blind is the first to act during the first betting round. If any players call the big blind, the big blind is then given an extra opportunity to raise. This is known as a "live blind". If the live blind checks, the betting round then ends. After the flop, turn and river, the first person to act is the player seated in the small blind position.


title: Blind (poker)

text: Generally, the "big blind" is equal to the minimum bet. The "small blind" is normally half the big blind. In cases where posting exactly half the big blind is impractical due to the big blind being some odd-valued denomination, the small blind is rounded (usually down) to the nearest practical value. For example, if the big blind in a live table game is $3, then the small blind will usually be $1 or $2 since most casinos do not distribute large quantities of $0.50 poker chips.


title: Blind (poker)

text: The blinds exist because Omaha and Texas hold 'em are frequently played without antes, allowing a player to fold his hand without placing a bet. The blind bets introduce a regular cost to take part in the game, thus inducing a player to enter pots in an attempt to compensate for that expense.


title: Blind (poker)

text: It is possible to play without blinds. The minimum bet is then the lowest denomination chip in play, and tossing only one chip is considered as a call. Anything higher than that is considered a raise. Poker without blinds is usually played with everyone posting an ante to receive cards.


title: Blind (poker)

text: In cash games, otherwise known as ring games, blinds primarily serve to ensure all players are subject to some minimum, ongoing cost for participating in the game. This encourages players to play hands they otherwise might not, thereby increasing the average size of the pots and, by extension, increasing the amount of rake earned by the cardroom hosting the game.


title: Blind (poker)

text: In cash games, the amount of the blinds are normally fixed for each particular table and will not change for the duration of the game. However, many cardrooms will allow blind levels to change in cases where all players unanimously agree to a change. Larger cardrooms will often include tables with different blind levels to give players the option of playing at whatever stakes they are most comfortable with. In online poker, blinds range from as little as one U.S. cent to USD1,000 or more.


title: Blind (poker)

text: The minimum and maximum buy-in at a table is usually set in relation to the big blind. At live games, the minimum buy-in is usually between 20 and 50 big blinds, while the maximum buy-in is usually between 100 and 250 big blinds. Some online cardrooms offer "short stack" tables where the maximum buy-in is 50 big blinds or less and/or "deep stack" tables where the minimum buy-in is 100 big blinds or more.


title: Blind (poker)

text: In cash games that do not deal cards to players who are absent from the table at the start of the hand (or, in online games, are designated as "sitting out"), special rules are necessary to deal with players who miss their blinds.


title: Blind (poker)

text: Players who miss their big blind will not be dealt in again until the button has passed them. At that point, the player must "super-post" (post both the big and small blinds) in order to rejoin the game and be dealt cards. Of these, only the big blind is considered "live" while the small blind is "dead"—it is placed in the center of the pot apart from the big blind and will not count towards calling any additional bets or raises by other players. If the player has only missed the small blind, then the same procedure applies except that the player only has to post the "dead" small blind to rejoin the game. Most cardrooms allow players to relieve themselves of these obligations if they wait until they are again due to post the big blind before rejoining the game.


title: Blind (poker)

text: Some cardrooms hosting live cash games do not allow players to miss their blinds in this manner. Rather, all players with chips on the table are dealt in whether or not they are present at the table. Any blinds due will be posted from the player's stack - depending on the cardroom's rules, this will be done either by the dealer, another cardroom employee or a nearby player under staff supervision. Players who do not return to the table by the time it is their turn to act are automatically folded.


title: Blind (poker)

text: In poker tournament play, blinds serve a dual purpose. In addition to the purpose explained above, blinds are also used to control how long the tournament will last. Before the tournament begins, the players will agree to a blinds structure, usually set by the tournament organizer. This structure defines how long each round is and how much the blinds increase per round. Typically, they are increased at a smooth rate of between 25% and 50% per round over the previous round. As the blinds increase, players need to increase their chip counts (or "stacks") to stay in the game. The blinds will eventually consume all of a player's stack if he or she does not play to win more.


title: Blind (poker)

text: Unlike many cash games, it is not possible for a player to "miss" blinds in a tournament. If a player is absent from the table, he will continue to have his or her cards dealt and mucked and will have blinds and, if applicable, antes taken from his stack as they are due, either until he or she returns or until his or her stack is completely consumed by blinds and antes. A player who loses his or her chips in this manner is said to have been "blinded off."


title: Blind (poker)

text: If each player in a tournament starts with 5,000 in chips and after four hours, the big blind is 10,000 (with a small blind of 5,000), it will be very difficult for a player with only 15,000 in chips to stay in the game.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Tesseract (often stylized as TesseracT) are an English progressive metal band from Milton Keynes. The band, formed in 2003, consists of Daniel Tompkins (lead vocals), Alec "Acle" Kahney (lead guitar and producer), James Monteith (rhythm guitar), Amos Williams (bass, backing vocals) and Jay Postones (drums, percussion). The band is currently signed to Kscope. They are credited as one of the bands to pioneer the djent movement in progressive metal. As of 2022, Tesseract have released four studio albums: "One", "Altered State", "Polaris" and "Sonder", as well as two live albums, "Odyssey/Scala" and "Portals", and the extended plays "Concealing Fate", "Perspective" and "Errai".


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Tesseract started out in 2003 while founding member Acle Kahney was recording and writing with his band Mikaw Barish. Kahney was also involved in the unofficial predecessor to Tesseract, Fellsilent. French vocalist Julien Perier supplied vocals during Tesseract's early stages, but the logistical difficulties of distance meant that he could not join the band permanently. After their first full lineup was realized, Tesseract began playing live shows and compiling material for their debut album; they released a three-song demo in 2007 containing parts of what would eventually become their debut album, "One".


title: Tesseract (band)

text: In 2009, the original lead vocalist, Abisola Obasanya, left the band and was replaced by Daniel Tompkins. Acle had come into contact with Tompkins while assisting with the production of the album, "Atlantic" with his previous band, First Signs of Frost. The band reworked the album's songs with Tompkins, moving towards a 2010 release. Just before beginning their first major tour series, Tesseract released "Concealing Fate", a six-track suite that forms the centrepiece of their debut album, "One", which was released on 22 March 2011. Later that year, Tesseract toured throughout the UK in support of "One" with openers Chimp Spanner and Uneven Structure, and also performed at the Sonisphere Festival in Knebworth.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: On 20 August 2011, rumours began spreading that vocalist Daniel Tompkins had left the band, as Tesseract were seen performing with a different vocalist during a gig at the Craufurd Arms in Milton Keynes. This was confirmed by the band a few days later on 23 August, when they introduced Elliot Coleman as the band's new vocalist. Daniel Tompkins went on to sing for the progressive metal band, Skyharbor, the pop rock band, In Colour, and his experimental side project White Moth Black Butterfly.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: In September 2011, an instrumental version of "One" was digitally released and in October 2011, both the original and the instrumental versions were released on vinyl as a double LP.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: During early 2012, Tesseract worked on an acoustic EP inspired by the radio acoustic session they played in Brooklyn, New York a year before. This came to be known as "Perspective", which was released on 25 May 2012.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: On 12 June 2012 Tesseract announced that Coleman had amicably left the band. On 7 September 2012 the band announced that they had found their yet-unnamed new vocalist and would release the single, "Nocturne", on 12 October. A series of shows in Europe was also announced, including a performance at Euroblast Festival. It was later revealed that the new singer was Ashe O'Hara of British progressive metal band Voices from the Fuselage. Tesseract issued a short statement about the new vocalist on their website.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: On 28 February 2013 the band unveiled a release date for "Altered State" alongside a full track listing of the album. The album is a 51-minute continuous piece divided into four large sections ("Of Matter", "Of Mind", "Of Reality", "Of Energy"), each of which contains several tracks. On 30 April "Singularity" was aired on BBC Radio 1's Rock show, and was later released on their SoundCloud account.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: During a phone interview with Metal Injection, Williams stated that the band would be going on tour in the United States during the summer of 2013 and touring Europe in late 2013.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: "Altered State" was streamed in its entirety on 12 May 2013 on Century Media's official YouTube channel, two weeks before its 27 May release.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: On 27 June 2014, it was announced that Ashe O'Hara had left the band and that Dan Tompkins would be rejoining, leaving Skyharbor in the process. On 18 May 2015, Tesseract released "Odyssey/Scala", their first live DVD and album compilation.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Shortly after Daniel Tompkins reunited with the band, writing and recording for a third studio album began. The band made frequent updates on social media depicting the members tracking multiple instruments in studio. On 10 July 2015 Tesseract's official Facebook page released a video teaser for the new album titled "Polaris". They also released album art and set a release date for 18 September 2015. A full album stream was uploaded to YouTube by Kscope Music on 15 September 2015. In November 2015, the band toured in support of the new album with opening bands including The Contortionist, ERRA and Skyharbor.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Writing for "Sonder" was done throughout 2017. The band released the promo single, "Smile", on 23 June 2017. Several band members, including Acle Kahney and Amos Williams, acknowledged that the single was not a complete final mix and it would be further refined before its release on Sonder. According to Amos on Kscope's website, "We have a solid idea of where we would like to take this track on the next album, as it is in no way finished." Tesseract's fourth studio album, "Sonder", was announced on 8 February 2018. The lead single, "Luminary", was also released on 8 February, and a second single, "King", was released on 16 March. The full album was released on 20 April 2018.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Dan Tompkins began to pursue a solo career during this period, releasing his first solo album "Castles" in 2019 and his second "Ruins" in 2020. "Castles" has a dark pop/electronic rock sound, whilst "Ruins" is a progressive metal re-working of "Castles" with a brand new song "The Gift" (a collaboration between him and Matt Heafy of Trivium).


title: Tesseract (band)

text: In 2020, Tesseract performed "Portals", described as a "live cinematic experience" as a ticketed online stream. Drummer Jay Postones was replaced by Mike Malyan (drummer of Monuments) for the event, since Postones chose to stay in Texas due to the necessary two-week isolation from the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: In 2022, Tesseract released a special double A-side to raise money for the people of Ukraine. "These songs have been in the TesseracT domain for a while. We had developed them for album 5, but they just weren't the right fit for where that album has headed. Rather than have them slowly decay on a server somewhere, we felt they could do something good, no matter how small? [sic]"


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Tesseract play a specific style of progressive metal that features open tunings on their guitars, polyrhythmic riffs, odd time signatures and several atmospheric layers. The band have stated that they do not compose their music with specific polyrhythms in mind, but play what they feel fits the groove. They also include a mid-range distorted guitar tone and melodic clean passages, heavily influenced by ambient music. The band typically plays in the style of the subgenre djent, pioneered by Meshuggah and SikTh.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: The vocal style of the band has seen a considerable shift. On "One", Daniel Tompkins employed a mixture of clean and harsh vocals, with an emphasis on long, drawn out notes. However, Ashe O'Hara's performances on "Altered State" contained no harsh vocals at all. In an interview with Metalspree, Ashe stated, "[R]ight now, being ourselves is to have purely melodic vocals. With 'One' they felt they had to have harsh vocals in order to be accepted by the community. But, they've never really wanted to be that type of band". Harsh vocals returned to the band's sound following Dan Tompkins' return to the band, although they stuck to a mostly melodic and clean direction with the vocals on "Polaris" and "Sonder".


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Throughout their career, the band have produced, mixed and mastered all of their material themselves. Williams is a qualified audio engineer and Acle Kahney has carried out production, mixing and mastering work for several other progressive metal bands under the name 4D Sounds.


title: Tesseract (band)

text: Amos Williams stated in an interview that Tesseract's music is relatively reliant on the bass in comparison to other metal bands: He states that "[The bass] is always on its own little shelf" in the music and that during the production process, "We left a lot of room for there to be sub and actual bass stuff going on".


title: Bolloré

text: Bolloré SE () is a French conglomerate headquartered in Puteaux, on the western outskirts of Paris, France. Founded in 1822, the company has interests in Vivendi, international freight forwarding, oil storage and pipelines in France, solid state batteries, access control systems for buildings, palm oil and rubber in Asia and Africa, olive groves in the US and wine production in France.


title: Bolloré

text: In 2004, the group ranked amongst the top 200 European companies. The company is listed on the Euronext exchange in Paris, but the Bolloré family retains majority control of the company through a complex and indirect holding structure.


title: Bolloré

text: The firm was founded in 1822, in Ergué-Gabéric, near Quimper, Brittany by Nicolas Le Marié (1797-1870), as a paper manufacturer named "papeteries d'Odet". Beginning in 1863, it was directed by Jean-René Bolloré (1818–1881), a nephew by marriage who had obtained a medical doctorate in 1863.


title: Bolloré

text: The firm remained owned by the Bolloré family. Gwenn-Aël Bolloré was Vice-President of the Papeteries Bolloré from 1952 to 1974. In late 2004, the Bolloré group began taking an interest in the advertising sector, and started building a stake in Havas, becoming its single largest shareholder. In a boardroom coup, Alain de Pouzilhac was deposed as President and CEO on July 12, 2005. The Bolloré stake in Havas stood at 26%, and the group had 3 seats on the Havas board as of June 2006. Vincent Bolloré's son, Yannick Bolloré, became Havas' Chairman and CEO after its previous CEO stepped down in January 2014.


title: Bolloré

text: In 2005, Bolloré expanded its media interests by launching the television station Direct 8. The firm also began buying shares of the British media planning and buying group Aegis. Bolloré sold its 26% stake to Dentsu in 2012.


title: Bolloré

text: From 6 June 2006 to 22 December 2010, Bolloré launched a free evening newspaper Direct Soir. Lack of readers and advertising revenues made the group focus on its other free newspaper, "Direct Matin", launched in February 2007.


title: Bolloré

text: Bolloré manufactures the Bolloré Bluecar, a small electric car, initially produced to showcase the company's range of electric power cells. The Bluecar was introduced in December 2011 as part of the Autolib' carsharing service in Paris. Bluecar deliveries to retail customers began in March 2012.


title: Bolloré

text: In 2014, Bollore increased its stake in Havas from 36% to around 83% through a public exchange offer of new Bollore shares for Havas stock. The company said at the time it would like to hold onto a stake well in excess of 50%. In March 2015, Bollore sold a 22.5% stake in the media group for a price of around €600 million.


title: Bolloré

text: The next month, in April 2015, Bolloré raised its stake in media company Vivendi from 10.2% to 12.01% at a total cost of €568 million. As of 2016, it owns 20% of Vivendi (30% voting power), 60% of Havas and 9% of Gaumont.


title: Bolloré

text: In December 2021, After refusing to comment on market “rumors” announcing its intention to sell its transport and logistics subsidiary in Africa, Bolloré Africa Logistics (BAL), the Bolloré group announced that it had received an offer from the giant Swiss MSC for this subsidiary in Africa.


title: Bolloré

text: Bolloré is 63% owned by Financière de l'Odet, the holding company controlled by the Bolloré family. Vincent Bolloré announced that his son, Cyrille Bolloré, would take over the CEO position of Bolloré after the April 15, 2019 shareholders meeting. This was done days before Vincent Bolloré himself "was charged by French police in a bribery case relating to operations in Africa."


title: Bolloré

text: There are plans to integrate payment for the bike and car hire schemes with the ticketing systems for traditional modes of public transport. Two electric vehicle manufacturers are said to be in the frame to supply the cars: the Dassault Group and Bolloré. The former has a vehicle called the Cleanova, which employs the body of the Renault Kangoo van, while Bolloré’s Bluecar has been developed with Italian styling house Pininfarina and is due to go on sale commercially in 2009.


title: Bolloré

text: Pininfarina introduced its own electric vehicle concept, the Pininfarina B0 ("B Zero"). The four-seat hatchback features a solid-state lithium-polymer battery, supercapacitors, and a roof- integrated solar panel to achieve a range of 153 miles. Developed in partnership with the Bolloré Group, the vehicle was slated for limited production in 2009.


title: Bolloré

text: Bolloré manufactures the Bolloré Bluecar, a small electric car, initially produce to showcase the company's range of electric power cells. The Bluecar was introduced in December 2011, as part of the Autolib' carsharing service in Paris. Bluecar deliveries to retail customers began in March 2012. Bolloré's Bluecar is also used in the Bluecity London car sharing scheme.


title: Bolloré

text: Bolloré Bluebus 22 is a 6-metre-long electric microbus with a capacity of 22 passengers. Two copies of this electric vehicle transportation arrived mid-April 2015 to Mulhouse, Haut-Rhin.


title: Bolloré

text: Bolloré Bluebus SE is a full-sized (12-metre) low-floor electric citybus that has been produced since 2015. Several "Bluebus SE" are in commercial use in Paris and in Brussels. In early 2022 RATP, the public traffic provider of Paris, suspended all 149 Bluebus 5SE after a series of busses catching fire.


title: Bolloré

text: According to a 2018 New York Times report, the company's air, sea, and land transportation network constitutes a "virtual stranglehold" on West African transport. Bolloré controls 18 ports along the western coast of the continent.


title: Bolloré

text: There are ongoing investigations into the role of drastically discounted Havas communications services accorded to Guinean candidate Alpha Condé and Togan president Faure Gnassingbé during their presidential campaigns in the awarding of key port concessions in Conakry, Guinea and Lomé, Togo to Bolloré SA. After winning the election, Condé awarded a port-contract to Bolloré, terminating that of the competing Necotrans company. In a settlement, Bolloré paid €2 million to Necotrans without admitting guilt.


title: Bolloré

text: In January 2021 Vincent Bolloré and two other Bolloré executives pleaded guilty at a Paris court for supplying €370,000 worth of communication services to Gnassingbé. A 2021 Ghanaian ministerial committee investigation concluded that Bolloré secured an under the table deal with the John Mahama administration for building a new container terminal at Tema with terms strongly favouring the company at the expense of the Ghanaian government.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Duncan Sheik (born November 18, 1969) is an American singer-songwriter and composer. Sheik is known for his 1996 debut single "Barely Breathing", which earned him a Grammy Award nomination for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance. He has composed music for motion pictures and Broadway musicals, winning the 2006 Tony Awards for Best Original Score and Best Orchestrations for his work on the musical "Spring Awakening".


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Sheik is a native of Montclair, New Jersey. Following his parents' divorce, he split time between his father's house in New Jersey and his mother's home in South Carolina. He is the half-brother of Broadway actress Kacie Sheik. Sheik's Juilliard-trained grandmother introduced him to the piano, and he later took up the electric guitar. By age 12, he was playing guitar with high school students in a cover band. After graduating from Phillips Academy, Andover in 1988, Sheik studied semiotics at Brown University; while at Brown, he played guitar in a band with fellow Brown student Lisa Loeb. Following his graduation from Brown in 1992, he moved to Los Angeles.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Early in his musical career, Sheik played guitar for other artists, including Liz and Lisa (with Elizabeth Mitchell and Lisa Loeb). Sheik also played on His Boy Elroy's 1993 album through his connections from a fellow Brown alum, Tracee Ellis Ross.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 1996, Sheik released his self-titled debut album, which was certified gold. The album featured the hit single "Barely Breathing", which peaked at number 16 and remained on the "Billboard" Hot 100 for 55 consecutive weeks. "Barely Breathing" also enjoyed Top 20 success on Adult Contemporary radio, reached No. 2 on the Adult Top 40 charts, and garnered Sheik a Grammy Award nomination for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 1998, Sheik recorded "Embraceable You" for "Red Hot + Rhapsody", a George Gershwin tribute to increase AIDS awareness, and also recorded "Songbird" for another tribute, "Legacy: A Tribute to Fleetwood Mac's Rumours". Also in 1998, Sheik released "Humming", an experimental follow-up with string arrangements.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Sheik released "Phantom Moon", a Nick Drake-influenced album on which he collaborated with poet and writer Steven Sater, in 2001. The following year, Sheik released "Daylight", a brighter, more modern-sounding album which included the singles, "On A High" and "Half-Life". After a four-year recording break, Sheik released "White Limousine" (2006), an album which included companion software on a DVD-ROM to remix individual tracks. In 2008, Sheik was a judge at the 7th annual Independent Music Awards.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2009 he released "Whisper House", a concept album which provided the score for the musical of the same name. The stage musical premiered at The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego in January 2010, after a workshop at Vassar College, produced by New York Stage and Film in 2009.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2011, Sheik released "Covers 80's", an album including covers of popular 1980s songs. Concert dates in support of the album were later canceled due to Sheik seeking treatment for alcohol addiction. A remixed version of the album was released the following year. Sheik released a new studio album entitled "Legerdemain" in October 2015.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In addition to being a singer-songwriter, Sheik has also composed music for plays, musicals, and movie soundtracks. He composed original music for the 2002 New York Shakespeare Festival production of "Twelfth Night".


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2004, he composed the score for the film "A Home at the End of the World". The "AllMusic" reviewer wrote: "...takes the sensitivity and tension of the film's plot and crafts incidental music and new songs that complement the movie well." He composed the score for the 2005 film "Through the Fire" with Pete Miser.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Sheik wrote the music for "Spring Awakening" (2006) in collaboration with Steven Sater. Written over a period of eight years, the musical, which premiered off-Broadway during the summer, opened on Broadway to critical acclaim later in the fall. The musical was based on the controversial German expressionist play "The Awakening of Spring", written by Frank Wedekind. Sheik won the 2006 Tony Award for Best Orchestrations for his work on "Spring Awakening", and he and Sater won a Tony Award for Best Original Score. In addition, "Spring Awakening" won the Tony Award for Best Musical and a Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album. The guitar that Sheik used to compose songs for "Spring Awakening" was displayed at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center. As of 2012, Sheik was composing music for a feature-film adaptation of "Spring Awakening", an adaptation almost a decade in the making.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2012, Sheik wrote "Alice By Heart", an adaptation of Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland", along with collaborator Sater. Directed by Jessie Nelson with musical direction by Lance Horne, the musical was workshopped at the Royal National Theatre and commissioned by the National Theatre Connections.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Sheik wrote the music and lyrics to the 2013 musical adaptation of "American Psycho", which opened at the Almeida Theatre in London, and was later staged on Broadway in 2016.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2013, Sheik wrote the music for the musical adaptation of the novel "Because of Winn-Dixie", which premiered at the Arkansas Repertory Theatre. "Dixie" was a collaboration with then-director John Tartaglia and Nell Benjamin, who wrote the book and lyrics. The musical ran at the Goodspeed Opera House, East Haddam, Connecticut from July 2019 to September 2019, directed by John Rando.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2015, Sheik wrote the musical thriller "Noir" with Kyle Jarrow. It premiered as part of New York Stage and Film's season in July to August 2015 at the Powerhouse Theater at Vassar College. Inspired by live radio plays and classic film noir, the musical was directed by Rachel Chavkin.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2016 he prepared the music for the Shakespeare Theatre Company (Washington, D.C.) production of "The Taming of the Shrew", described in "The Washington Post" as "an assortment of preexisting songs by singer-songwriter Duncan Sheik".


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2000, Sheik wrote the foreword to "The Way of Youth: Buddhist Common Sense for Handling Life's Questions", by Soka Gakkai International leader Daisaku Ikeda.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: In 2006, Sheik recorded the song "A Purple Trail" for "Other Songs and Dances, Vol. 1". In 2008, Sheik participated in "", an initiative to support Tibet, Dalai Lama, and Tenzin Gyatso.


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Concert dates in support of Sheik's 2011 album "Covers 80's" were canceled when Sheik sought treatment for alcohol addiction. In a message to fans on his tumblr blog, Sheik noted that he had entered a treatment center on the same day his latest album was released and had told his staff, "My record is coming "out" and I’m checking "in"."


title: Duncan Sheik

text: Sheik practices Nichiren Buddhism and is a member of the US branch of the worldwide Buddhist association Soka Gakkai International.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic (Latvian SSR), also known as Soviet Latvia or simply Latvia, was a federated republic within the Soviet Union, and formally one of its 16 (later 15) constituent republics. The Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic was in existence for 51 years, from August 5, 1940 to September, 6 1991.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Soviet annexation of Latvia took place in August of 1939 to the agreed terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact (Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact). In 1939 Latvia was forced to grant military bases on its soil to the Soviet Union, and in 1940 the Soviet Red Army moved into Latvia, which was effectively incorporated into the Soviet Union.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The territory changed hands during World War II with Nazi Germany occupying a large portion of Latvian territory from 1941 to 1944.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Soviet instability and the dissolution of the Soviet Union provided the impetus for Latvia to regain independence.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: On 24 September 1939, the USSR entered the airspace of Estonia, flying numerous intelligence-gathering operations. On September 25, Moscow demanded that Estonia sign a Soviet–Estonian Mutual Assistance Treaty that would allow the USSR to establish military bases and station troops on its soil. Latvia was next in line, as the USSR demanded the signing of a similar treaty. The authoritarian government of Kārlis Ulmanis accepted the ultimatum, signing the Soviet–Latvian Mutual Assistance Treaty on 5 October 1939. On 16 June 1940, after the USSR had already invaded Lithuania, it issued an ultimatum to Latvia which was followed by the Soviet occupation of Latvia on June 17.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov accused Latvia and the other Baltic states of forming a military conspiracy against the Soviet Union, and so Moscow presented ultimatums, demanding new concessions, which included the replacement of governments with new ones, "determined to fulfil the treaties of friendship sincerely" and allowing an unlimited number of troops to enter the three countries. Hundreds of thousands Soviet troops entered Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. These additional Soviet military forces far outnumbered the armies of each country.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Ulmanis government decided that, in conditions of international isolation and the overwhelming Soviet force both on the borders and inside the country, it was better to avoid bloodshed and an unwinnable war. The Latvian army did not fire a shot and was quickly decimated by purges and included in the Red Army.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Ulmanis' government resigned and was replaced by a left-wing government created under instructions from the USSR embassy. Up until the election of the People's Parliament on 14-15 July 1940 there were no public statements about governmental plans to introduce a Soviet political order or to join the Soviet Union. Soon after the occupation, the Communist Party of Latvia was legalised as the only legal party and presented the "Latvian Working People's Bloc" for the elections. It was the only permitted participant in the election, after an attempt by other politicians to include the Democratic Bloc (an alliance of all banned Latvian parties, except the Social Democratic Workers' Party) on the ballot was prevented by the government. Its office was closed, election leaflets confiscated and its leaders arrested.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The election results themselves were fabricated; the Soviet press service released them so early that they appeared in a London newspaper a full 24 hours before the polls had closed. All Soviet army personnel present in the country were allowed to vote.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The newly-elected People's Parliament convened on 21 July to declare the creation of the Latvian SSR and request admission to the Soviet Union on the same day. Such a change in the basic constitutional order of the state was illegal under the Constitution of Latvia, because such a change could only be enacted after a plebiscite with two-thirds of the electorate approving. On August 5, the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union completed the process of annexation by accepting the Latvian petition and formally incorporated Latvia into the Soviet Union.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Some of the Latvian diplomats stayed in the West and the Latvian Diplomatic Service continued to advocate the cause of Latvia's freedom for the next 50 years.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Following the Soviet pattern, the real power in the republic was in the hands of the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Latvia, while the titular head of the republic (Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet) and the head of the executive (the Chairman of the Soviet of the Ministers) were in subordinate positions. Therefore, the history of Soviet Latvia can broadly be divided in the periods of rule by the First Secretaries: Jānis Kalnbērziņš, Arvīds Pelše, Augusts Voss, Boris Pugo.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In the following months of 1940, the Soviet Constitution and criminal code (copied from Russian) were introduced. The elections of July 1940 were followed by elections to the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union in January 1941. The remaining Baltic Germans and anyone who could claim to be one emigrated to the German Reich.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: On August 7, 1940, all print media and printing houses were nationalised. Most of the existing magazines and newspapers were discontinued or appeared under new, Soviet names. In November 1940 banning of books began, in total, some 4,000 titles were banned and removed from circulation. Arrests and deportations of some authors, like Aleksandrs Grīns, began, while others, such as Jānis Sudrabkalns, started writing poems about Stalin.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: As Latvia had implemented a sweeping land reform after the independence, most farms were too small for nationalisation. While rumours of impending collectivisation were officially denied in 1940 and 52,000 landless peasants were given small plots of up to 10 ha, in early 1941 preparations for collectivisation began. The small size of land plots and imposition of the production quotas and high taxes meant that very soon independent farmers would go bankrupt and had to establish collective farms.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Arrests and deportations to the Soviet Union began even before Latvia officially became a part of it. Initially, they were limited to the most prominent political and military leaders like President Kārlis Ulmanis, War Minister Jānis Balodis and Army Chief Krišjānis Berķis who were arrested in July 1940. The Soviet NKVD also arrested most of the White Russian émigrés, who had found refuge in Latvia. Very soon purges reached the upper echelons of the puppet government when minister of welfare Jūlijs Lācis was arrested.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In early 1941 the Soviet central government began planning the mass deportation of "anti-Soviet elements" from the occupied Baltic states. In preparation, General Ivan Serov, Deputy People's Commissar of Public Security of the Soviet Union, signed the Serov Instructions, "Regarding the Procedure for Carrying out the Deportation of Anti-Soviet Elements from Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia." During the night of 13–14 June 1941, 15,424 inhabitants of Latvia – including 1,771 Jews and 742 ethnic Russians – were deported to camps and special settlements, mostly in Siberia. While among the deported were such obvious candidates as former politicians, wealthy businessmen and farmers, policemen, members of Aizsargi and NGO leaders, even philatelists and enthusiasts of Esperanto were included in the June deportation as unreliable elements. Some 600 Latvian officers were arrested in the Litene army camp, many of them executed on the spot. Many political prisoners were summarily executed in prisons all over Latvia during the hasty Soviet retreat after the German attack on June 22, 1941. In total Latvia lost some 35,000 people during the first year of the Soviet rule.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Some of the deportees had received warnings to stay away from home and were hiding either among friends or in forests. After the German-Soviet war began many of them organised small guerrilla units and attacked the retreating Red Army soldiers and greeted Germans with the flag of independent Latvia.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Nazi invasion, launched a week later, cut short immediate plans to deport several hundred thousand more from the Baltics. Nazi troops occupied Riga on 1 July 1941.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: During the short period of interregnum Latvians created two bodies that sought to restore independent Latvia: the Central Organising Committee for Liberated Latvia and the Provisional State Council.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Immediately after the instalment of Nazi German authority, a process of eliminating the Jewish and Gypsy population began, with many killings taking place in Rumbula.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The killings were committed by the Einsatzgruppe A, the Wehrmacht and Marines (in Liepāja), as well as by Latvian collaborators, including the 500–1,500 members of the Arajs Commando (which alone killed around 26,000 Jews) and the 2,000 or more Latvian members of the SD. By the end of 1941 almost the entire Jewish population was killed or placed in the death camps. In addition, some 25,000 Jews were brought from Germany, Austria and the present-day Czech Republic, of whom around 20,000 were killed. The Holocaust claimed approximately 85,000 lives in Latvia, the vast majority of whom were Jews.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: A large number of Latvians resisted the German occupation. The resistance movement was divided between the pro-independence politicians of the Latvian Central Council and the armed Soviet partisan units under the Latvian Partisan Movement Headquarters (латвийский штаб партизанского движения) in Moscow. Their Latvian commander was Arturs Sproģis.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Nazis planned to Germanize the Baltics by settling some 520,000 German settlers there 20–25 years after the war. In 1943 and 1944 two divisions of Latvian Legion were created through a forced mobilisation and made a part of Waffen SS in order to help Germany against the Red Army.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In the middle of 1944, when the Soviet Operation Bagration reached Latvia, heavy fighting took place between German and Soviet troops which ended with a stalemate and the creation of the Courland Pocket which allowed some 130,000 Latvians to escape to Sweden and Germany.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: During the course of the war, both occupying forces conscripted Latvians into their armies, in this way increasing the loss of the nation's "live resources". In Courland, Latvian Legion units fought battles against Latvians of the Red Army.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In total, Latvia lost some 20% of its population during World War II. In 1944 part of Abrene District, about 2% of Latvia's territory, was illegally ceded to the RSFSR.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In 1944 the Soviets immediately began to reinstate the Soviet system. After re-establishing military control over the country, in February 1946, elections of the Soviet Union's Supreme Soviet were held, followed, in February 1947, by Latvian Supreme Soviet elections and only in January 1948 elections to the local Soviets.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: After the German surrender it became clear that Soviet forces were there to stay, and Latvian national partisans began their fight against another occupier: the Soviet Union. At their peak, some 10,000–15,000 partisans in disorganised units fought local battles against Communists, NKVD troops and Soviet government representatives. Forest brothers consisted not only of the former Legionnaires or German supporters, but men who were trying to avoid Soviet conscription, dispossessed farmers, even priests and school pupils who wrote and distributed patriotic leaflets and provided shelter to partisans. Many believed that a new war between the Western powers and the Soviet Union was imminent and expected Latvia to be liberated soon. After the 1949 deportations and collectivisation, the resistance movement decreased sharply, with the last few individuals surrendering in 1956, when amnesty was offered. The last holdout was Jānis Pīnups, who hid from authorities until 1995.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: 120,000 Latvian inhabitants deemed disloyal by the Soviets were imprisoned or deported to Soviet concentration camps (the Gulag). Some managed to escape arrest and joined the Forest Brothers.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: On 25 March 1949, 43,000 mostly rural residents ("kulaks") were deported to Siberia and northern Kazakhstan in Operation Priboi, which was implemented in all three Baltic States and approved in Moscow already on 29 January 1949. Whole families were arrested and almost 30% of deported were children under 16.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In the post-war period, Latvia was forced to adopt Soviet farming methods and the economic infrastructure developed in the 1920s and 1930s was eradicated. Farms belonging to refugees were confiscated, German supporters had their farm sizes sharply reduced and much of the farmland became state owned. The remaining farmers had their taxes and obligatory produce delivery quotas increased until individual farming became impossible. Many farmers killed their cattle and moved to cities. In 1948 collectivisation began in earnest and was intensified after the March 1949 deportations and by the end of the year 93% of farms were collectivised.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Collective farming was extremely unprofitable as farmers had to plant and harvest according to the state plan and not the actual harvest conditions. Farmers were paid close to nothing for their produce. Grain production in Latvia collapsed from 1.37 million tons in 1940 to 0.73 million tons in 1950 and 0.43 million tons in 1956. Only in 1965 did Latvia reach the meat and dairy output levels of 1940.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: During the first post-war years, Moscow's control was enforced by the Special Bureau of CPSU Central Committee, led by Mikhail Suslov. To ensure total control over the local Communist party a Russian, Ivan Lebedev, was elected as the Second Secretary, this tradition continued until the end of the Soviet system. Lack of politically reliable local cadres meant that the Soviets increasingly placed Russians in party and government leadership positions. Many "Russian Latvian" Communists who had survived the so-called 1937–38 "Latvian Operation" during the Great Purge were sent back to the homeland of their parents. Most of these Soviets did not speak Latvian and this only enforced the wall of distrust against the local population. By 1953 Latvia's Communist Party had 42,000 members, half of whom were Latvians.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: To replace the lost population (due to war casualties, refugees to the West and deportees to the East) and to implement a heavy industrialisation program, hundreds of thousands of Russians were moved to Latvia. An extensive program of Russification was initiated, limiting the use of Latvian and minority languages. In addition, the leading and progressive role of Russian people throughout Latvian history was heavily emphasised in school books, arts and literature. The remaining poets, writers and painters had to follow the strict canons of socialist realism and to live in constant fear of being accused of some ideological mistake which could lead to ban from publication or even arrest.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: During the short rule of Lavrentiy Beria in 1953, the policy of giving more power to local communists and respecting local languages was introduced. More freedoms came after the 1956 de-Stalinization. Some 30,000 survivors of Soviet deportations began returning to Latvia. Many of them were barred from working in certain professions or returning to their homes.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Soon after Stalin's death number of Latvians in the Communist party began to increase. By this time many locally born communists had achieved positions of power and they began advocating a program that centred on ending the inflow of Russian speaking immigrants, end to the growth of heavy industry and creating light industries better suited for local needs, increasing the role and power of the locally born communists, enforcing the Latvian language as the "state language". This group was led by Eduards Berklavs who in 1957 became the Vice-Chairman of the Council of Ministers. Orders were issued that non-Latvian Communists should learn some Latvian within two years or lose their jobs.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: They were opposed by the "Russian Latvian" communists who had been born to Latvian parents in Russia or the Soviet Union, had returned to Latvia only after World War II and usually did not speak, or avoided speaking Latvian in public. They were supported by the politically influential officer corps of the Baltic Military District.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In April 1959 a fact-finding delegation from Soviet Central Committee visited Riga. During Nikita Khrushchev's visit to Riga in June 1959 hard-line elements complained about the nationalist tendencies in the Party and with the blessing from Moscow started purges of national communists and local communists, who had been in power since 1940. In November 1959 the long-serving First Secretary of the Party Kalnbērziņš and Prime Minister Vilis Lācis resigned from their posts and were replaced by hardliners. During the next three years, some 2000 national communists were dismissed from their positions, moved to insignificant posts in the countryside or Russia.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The first post-war census in 1959 showed that the number of Latvians since 1935 had declined by 170,000, while Russians had increased by 388,000, Belorussians by 35,000 and Ukrainians by 28,000.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Because Latvia had still maintained a well-developed infrastructure and educated specialists it was decided in Moscow that some of the Soviet Union's most advanced manufacturing factories were to be based in Latvia. New industry was created in Latvia, including a major machinery factory RAF and electrotechnical factories, as well as some food and oil processing plants. TV broadcasts from Riga started in 1954, the first in the Baltics.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: During 1959–1962 the leading Latvian national communists were purged as Arvīds Pelše enforced his power.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The orthodox Marxist Pelše is often remembered for the official ban in 1961 of the Latvian midsummer Jāņi celebrations and many other Latvian traditions and folk customs.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Between 1959 and 1968 nearly 130,000 Russian speakers immigrated to Latvia and began working in the large industrial factories that were built at rapid speed. The newly arrived immigrants were the first in line to receive apartments in the newly built micro-districts. Large factories, employing tens of thousands of recently arrived immigrants, and completely dependent on resources from faraway Soviet regions, produced products – the majority of which were then sent back to other Soviet republics. Many of the new factories were under All-Union ministry and military jurisdiction, thus operating outside the planned economy of the Soviet Latvia. Latvia's VEF and Radiotehnika factories specialized in production of radios, telephones and sound systems. Most of the Soviet railway carriages were made in Rīgas Vagonbūves Rūpnīca and mini buses in Riga Autobus Factory.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In 1962 Riga began receiving Russian gas for industrial needs and domestic heating. This allowed large scale construction of new micro-districts and high-rises to begin. In 1965 Pļaviņas Hydroelectric Power Station began producing electricity.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: As there were not enough people to operate the newly built factories, and in order to expand industrial production, workers from outside of the Latvian SSR (mainly Russians) were transferred into the country, noticeably decreasing the proportion of ethnic Latvians. The speed of Russification was also influenced by the fact that Riga was the HQ of the Baltic Military District, with active and retired Soviet officers moving there.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Increased investments and subsidies for collective farms greatly increased the living standards of the rural population without much increase in production output. Much of the farm produce was still grown on small private plots. In order to improve rural living standards, a mass campaign was started to liquidate individual family farms and to move people into smaller agricultural towns where they were given apartments. Farmers became paid workers in collective farms.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: While the early Voss era continued with the modernizing impulse of the 1960s, a visible stagnation began by the mid-1970s. High-rise prestige objects in Riga, such as the hotel Latvija and the Ministry of Agriculture building, took many years to complete. A new international airport and the Vanšu Bridge over Daugava were built.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: An ideological model of "live and let live" set in. The black market, absenteeism and alcoholism became widespread. Consumer goods shortages were a norm. Latvians turned to escapism: the music of Raimonds Pauls, the historic comedies of Riga Film Studio and even Poetry Days became hugely popular.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In the second half of the 1980s, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began the introduction of the political and economic reforms of glasnost and Perestroika. In the summer of 1987 large demonstrations were held in Riga at the Freedom Monument. In the summer of 1988 a national movement cohered in the Popular Front of Latvia. The Latvian SSR, along with the other Baltic Republics, was allowed greater autonomy and in 1988 the old national flag of Latvia was legalized, replacing the Soviet Latvian flag as the official flag in 1990. Pro-independence Latvian Popular Front candidates gained a two-thirds majority in the Supreme Council in the March 1990 democratic elections.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: On May 4, 1990; the Council passed the declaration "On the Restoration of Independence of the Republic of Latvia," which declared the Soviet annexation void and announced the start of a transitional period to independence. It argued that the 1940 occupation violated international law. It also argued that the 1940 resolution acceding to the Soviet Union was illegal, since the 1922 Latvian constitution stipulated that any major change in the state order had to be submitted to a referendum. In any case, the declaration argued that the 1940 elections were conducted on the basis of an illegal and unconstitutional election law, which rendered all actions of the "People's Saeima" "ipso facto" void. On these bases, the Supreme Council argued that the Republic of Latvia, as proclaimed in 1918, still legally existed even though its sovereignty had been "de facto" lost in 1940.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Latvia took the position that it did not need to follow the process of secession delineated in the Soviet constitution, arguing that since the annexation was illegal and unconstitutional, it was merely reasserting independence that still existed under international law. However, the central power in Moscow continued to regard Latvia as a Soviet republic in 1990–1991. In January 1991, Soviet political and military forces tried unsuccessfully to overthrow the Republic of Latvia authorities by occupying the central publishing house in Riga and establishing a Committee of National Salvation to usurp governmental functions. During the transitional period, Moscow maintained many central Soviet state authorities in Latvia. In spite of this, seventy-three percent of all Latvian residents confirmed their strong support for independence on March 3, 1991, in a non-binding advisory referendum. A large number of ethnic Russians also voted for the proposition. The Republic of Latvia declared the end of the transitional period and restored full independence on 21 August 1991 in the aftermath of the failed Soviet coup attempt. Latvia, as well as Lithuania and Estonia de facto ceased to be parts of the USSR four months before the Soviet Union itself ceased to exist (26 December 1991). Soon, on 6 September, the independence of three Baltic states was recognized by the USSR. Today's Republic of Latvia and other Baltic states consider themselves to be the legal continuation of the sovereign states whose first independent existence dates back to 1918–1940, and does not accept any legal connection with the former Latvian SSR which had been occupied and annexed into USSR 1940–1941 and 1944–1991. Since independence, the Communist Party of the Latvian SSR was discontinued, and a number of high-ranking Latvian SSR officials faced prosecution for their role in various human rights abuses during the Latvian SSR regime. Latvia later joined NATO and the European Union in 2004.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Soviet period saw rebuilding and increase of the industrial capacity, including the automobile (RAF) and electrotechnic (VEF) factories, food-processing industry, oil pipelines and the bulk-oil port Ventspils.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Part of the incorporation of the Latvian SSR into the Soviet Union was the introduction of the Russian language into all spheres of public life. Russian became a prerequisite for admission to higher education and better job occupations. It was also made a compulsory subject in all Latvian schools. Vast numbers of people were needed for the new factories and they were purposefully sent there from different parts of Russia, thus creating a situation wherein bigger towns became more and more russified up until the 1980s.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: National income per capita was higher in Latvia than elsewhere in the USSR (42% above the Soviet average in 1968); however Latvia was at the same time a relative contributor to the Federation's centre with an estimated 0.5% of the Latvian GDP going to Moscow.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: After the collapse of the Soviet Union, all of the economy branches associated with it collapsed as well. While a significant Russian presence in Latgale predated the Soviet Union (~30%), the intense industrialization and the heavy importation of labor from the Soviet Union to support it, led to significant increases in the Russian minority in Riga, even forming a majority in Latvian urban centers such as Daugavpils, Rēzekne, Ogre. Those areas were also hardest hit economically when the Soviet Union collapsed, leading to massive unemployment. Sharp disagreement with Russia over the legacy of the Soviet era has led to punitive economic measures by Russia, including the demise of transit trade as Russia cut off petroleum exports through Ventspils in 2003 (eliminating 99% of its shipments) after the government of Latvia refused to sell the oil port to the Russian state oil company, Transneft. The result is that only a fraction of Latvia's economy is connected with Russia, especially after it joined the European Union.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In 2016, a committee of historians and economists published a report "Latvian Industry Before and After Restoration of Independence" estimating overall cost of Soviet occupation in the years 1940–1990 at 185 billion euros, not counting the untangible costs of "deportations and imprisonment policy" of the Soviet authorities.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Soviet army had been stationed in Latvia since October 1939, when it demanded and received military bases in Courland where it stationed at least 25,000 soldiers, with air force, tanks and artillery support. The Soviet navy received rights to use ports in Ventspils and Liepāja. In addition to soldiers, uncontrolled numbers of officers' family members and construction workers arrived.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: During the first year of Soviet power, construction of the new military aerodromes was begun, often involving local population as unpaid construction workers. The Soviet navy took over seaports and shipping yards. Many hundreds of Soviet officers were moved into newly nationalized apartments and houses. Larger apartments were subdivided, creating communal apartments.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: After 1944, Latvia and Riga became heavily militarized. Demobilized soldiers and officers chose to move to Riga, creating severe housing shortages. Much of the new apartment building in the first post-war years was done only for the benefit of Soviet officers stationed in Riga.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The whole Baltic Sea coast of Courland became a Soviet border area with limited freedom of movement for the local inhabitants and closed for outsiders. Beaches were illuminated by searchlights and plowed, to show any footprints. The old fishing villages became closed military zones, fishermen were moved to larger townships: Roja, Kolka. The small coastal nation of Livonians virtually ceased to exist. Secret objects, like the Irbene radio telescope were built here. Liepāja port was littered with rusting submarines and beaches with unexploded phosphorus.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: By the mid-1980s, in addition to 350,000 soldiers of the Baltic Military District, an unknown number of border and interior ministry troops were stationed in the Baltics. In 1994 the departing Russian troops presented a list of over 3000 military units that were stationed in 700 sites taking over 120,000 ha, or about 10% of Latvian land.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: In addition to active military personnel, Riga was popular as a retirement town for Soviet officers, who could not retire to larger cities like Moscow or Kiev. Many thousands of them received preferential treatment in receiving new housing. In order to speed up the withdrawal of the Russian army, Latvia officially agreed to allow 20,000 retired Soviet officers and their families (up to 50,000 people) to remain in Latvia without granting them citizenship and Russia continues to pay them pensions.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The governments of the Baltic countries, the European Court of Human Rights, the United Nations Human Rights Council, the United States, and the European Union (EU), regard Latvia as being occupied by the Soviet Union in 1940 under the provisions of the 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. The European Parliament in recognising the occupation of the Baltic states from 1940 until the fall of the Soviet Union as illegal, led to the early acceptance of the Baltic states into the NATO alliance.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: Up to the reassessment of Soviet history in the USSR that began during Perestroika, before the USSR had condemned the 1939 secret protocol between Nazi Germany and itself that had led to the invasion and occupation of the three Baltic countries, the events in 1939 were as follows: The Government of the Soviet Union suggested that the Governments of the Baltic countries conclude mutual assistance treaties between the countries. Pressure from working people forced the governments of the Baltic countries to accept this suggestion. The Pacts of Mutual Assistance were then signed which allowed the USSR to station a limited number of Red Army units in the Baltic countries. Economic difficulties and dissatisfaction of the populace with the Baltic governments' policies that had sabotaged fulfillment of the Pact and the Baltic countries governments' political orientation towards Nazi Germany led to a revolutionary situation in June, 1940. To guarantee fulfillment of the Pact, additional military units entered Baltic countries, welcomed by the workers who demanded the resignations of the Baltic governments. In June under the leadership of the Communist Parties, political demonstrations by workers were held. The fascist governments were overthrown, and workers' governments formed. In July 1940, elections for the Baltic Parliaments were held. The "Working People's Unions", created by an initiative of the Communist Parties, received the majority of the votes. The Parliaments adopted the declarations of the restoration of Soviet powers in Baltic countries and proclaimed the Soviet Socialist Republics. Declarations of Estonia's, Latvia's and Lithuania's wishes to join the USSR were adopted and the Supreme Soviet of the USSR petitioned accordingly. The requests were approved by the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.


title: Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic

text: The Russian government and officials maintain that the Soviet annexation of the Baltic states was legitimate and that the Soviet Union liberated the countries from the Nazis. They state that the Soviet Union acted in response to Germany-oriented policies of the three Baltic states that resulted from alleged secret talks conducted by the governments of these states with Nazi leadership and that the subsequent entry of additional Soviet troops into the Baltics in 1940 was done following the agreements and with the consent of the then governments of the Baltic republics. Thus the official postulates of the Soviet historiography are continued without significant amendments. They also maintain that the USSR was not in a state of war and was not waging any combat activities on the territory of the three Baltic states; therefore, the word 'occupation' cannot be used. The Russian Foreign Ministry stated that "The assertions about [the] 'occupation' by the Soviet Union and the related claims ignore all legal, historical and political realities, and are therefore utterly groundless."


title: Firefall

text: Firefall is an American country rock band that formed in Boulder, Colorado, in 1974. It was founded by Rick Roberts, former member of the Flying Burrito Brothers, and Jock Bartley, who had been Tommy Bolin's replacement in Zephyr. The band's biggest hit single, "You Are the Woman", peaked at No. 9 on the "Billboard" chart in 1976. Other hits included "Just Remember I Love You" (#11 in 1977), "Strange Way" (#11 in 1978), "Cinderella" (#34 in 1977), "Headed for a Fall" (#35 in 1980), and "Staying with It" (#37 in 1981).


title: Firefall

text: In 1973 Rick Roberts and Jock Bartley met when Bartley was on tour with Gram Parsons as a member of his backing band, the Fallen Angels. Both the Fallen Angels and Roberts were performing in New York City at the same venue on consecutive nights. After the two were reunited in Boulder, Colorado, Roberts was impressed by Bartley's guitar work, and the duo soon began practicing together. Encouraged to form a band, they contacted bassist Mark Andes (a former member of the California bands Spirit and Jo Jo Gunne) who had temporarily retired to the mountains outside Boulder, and guitarist Larry Burnett (whom Roberts had met in his travels earlier that year). After Andes and Burnett joined in 1974, the band was called Firefall.


title: Firefall

text: Roberts got the name from the Yosemite Firefall at Yosemite National Park in California. The owners of a hotel threw burning logs off a mountain in a cascade as an annual event to entertain the guests.


title: Firefall

text: Guitarist/keyboardist Mark Hallman was another musician considered for Firefall, but Hallman rejected the offer and remained with his band Navarro. The drummer was Michael Clarke, who had been a member of The Byrds and The Flying Burrito Brothers.


title: Firefall

text: In 1975 Firefall recorded a demo tape consisting of three songs produced by Chris Hillman. Andes, Bartley, and Roberts were brought into Hillman's band. Before scheduled performances at The Other End in New York City in June 1975, Hillman became ill and was unable to play all the shows. Burnett and Clarke were then flown in to complete the commitments as Firefall. A&R representatives from Atlantic Records, who had already heard the band's demo tape, saw the Other End shows and signed Firefall to a multi-album contract. During the summer, when the contract was signed, Roberts was playing as a member of Stephen Stills' band, so work on the band's first album was delayed until late 1975. Roberts's high school friend David Muse was brought in before recording at Criteria Studios in Miami. The producer was Jim Mason, who had worked with the band Poco.


title: Firefall

text: The album "Firefall" was recorded in one month and released in April 1976. The group's first single, "Livin' Ain't Livin'", stopped short of the Top 40 in the Billboard Hot 100. In the following months, the band toured with Leon Russell, the Doobie Brothers, Tom Waits, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Roy Buchanan, Electric Light Orchestra, and The Band and were on a bill that included Willie Nelson, Jerry Jeff Walker, and Asleep at the Wheel. The band's next single, "You Are the Woman", reached the Top 10, and the band toured with Fleetwood Mac, who were at the beginning of their commercial peak. Another single, "Cinderella", was played extensively on FM radio but did not fare as well on AM, barely reaching the Top 40.


title: Firefall

text: Firefall returned to Criteria Studios to record their second album, which was to be titled "Tropical Nights". They were joined by the Memphis Horns and percussionist Joe Lala, a member of Manassas who had played on Firefall's debut album. But after hearing the final mix, Atlantic Records decided that the album needed to be reworked. With Jim Mason producing again, Firefall worked on the album that was renamed "Luna Sea", a pun on "lunacy", and released in July 1977. The album peaked at No. 27 on the "Billboard" magazine album chart and was certified gold two months after its release. The single "Just Remember I Love You", with backing vocals by Timothy B. Schmit, reached No. 11 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 singles chart.


title: Firefall

text: In a 2012 interview, Roberts recalled what was going on at this time: "Our business managers at that time were Dottie Ross and Mick Schneider, who operated as D&M Management. Although we didn't know it, it would appear that Mick Schneider had his own designs on managing the band. I can't really prove that, but he had been filling the gap as our de facto manager ever since we had parted company with our last official guy and he was getting pretty comfortable calling the shots. Mick Fleetwood got interested in taking over after we had been touring as an opening act for Fleetwood Mac on their "Rumours" tour. We entered into a spoken agreement with him and he went to work restructuring our recording contract with Atlantic Records. Things happened during that time that made it an unworkable arrangement. The first thing probably went a good way towards undermining any chance of a healthy working relationship with Mick. The band went to his house in Bel Air, California one day to try and hash out a written agreement. It was summertime, so we all went out and sat down around the pool. Present were all the members of the band as well as Mick, his road manager and confidant John Courage and his lawyer, Nick Shapiro. As we started to go through the proposed contract, the band started to function in their usual fashion; disputing every second word and generally being impossible to deal with. We had a very bad habit of that in almost all our business dealings. We also seemed to find a way to make the very worst possible decision at every opportunity. It took us about two hours of haggling to get through the first seven or so paragraphs. Mick's lawyer was obviously getting frustrated by the nit picking and we were all getting a little short tempered. The second thing that happened was a lot more serious and probably dealt the killing blow. After Mick had gotten Atlantic to agree to restructure our contract with a sizable cash advance ($500,000 I think) and an increase in the percentage points, Mick Schneider rejected it as not being satisfactory! At that point, Mick (Fleetwood) decided that maybe managing Firefall was not in his best interests. As a result, we went for about another year and a half without an official manager and Mick Schneider stayed in nominal control. We were not the easiest band to work with at any time and considering the fatigue factor, we were probably raging jerks and for all the chart success we had achieved, we were hardly making a decent living. We were mostly serving as an opening act on a lot of 'A' list tours, and as such, we weren't being paid like a band with an unbroken string of gold and platinum albums and more than a half dozen straight top fifty singles. It was nice to be doing shows in sold-out arenas every night, but going home after the tour was over with hardly anything in your pocket dulled the thrill a little. That only increased the tension in the band".


title: Firefall

text: In 1978 the band brought in Tom Dowd to produce their third album, "Elan", recording at Criteria and at the Record Plant in Los Angeles. The band and Dowd got along well but they had conflicting musical visions. The differences were apparently noticeable enough that the band's management, with help from their friend Mick Fleetwood, pressured the record label into letting them rework the album. This put the group in debt with the label, and within the year they parted ways with their management. The production team of Ron and Howard Albert were brought in to finish the record. "Elan", released in October 1978, became their first album to reach platinum status. The hit single "Strange Way" continued the band's commercial hot streak.


title: Firefall

text: After two years of non-stop recording and touring, the band was burned out and their financial situation was unstable. During a tour of Japan in August 1979, Michael Clarke, due to his excessive drinking, missed gigs or showed up in no condition to play. The band resorted to hiring a German drummer, Dan Holsten, whose playing technique was similar to Clarke's, to sit in. Holsten, who even looked a lot like Clarke, had played in several other bands in the Colorado area and caught the eye of Jock and Larry one night at a Colorado Springs bar. He became known as a reliable back-up drummer for tours and some studio work.


title: Firefall

text: Despite this, Atlantic Records still expected a new album. The band recorded the album sporadically over a year. The Alberts were again brought in to produce the album. But the band once again required a second effort, which was produced by Kyle Lehning. The result, titled "Undertow", was released in March 1980. This would be the last album with the original lineup. Upon completion of the album, Clarke and Mark Andes both left the band. Thirteen years later, in December 1993, Clarke died of alcoholism at his home in Treasure Island, Florida.


title: Firefall

text: Andes and Clarke were replaced by Kenny Loggins' former rhythm section, consisting of bassist George Hawkins and drummer Tris Imboden. With the two new players, the band recorded "Clouds Across the Sun", which was released in December 1980, and spawned the early 1981 hit "Staying with It", which was done as a duet with singer Lisa Nemzo. "Clouds" saw Jock emerging more as a writer and singer and had the band moving towards a harder "new wave music" direction on some of the tracks.


title: Firefall

text: Hawkins resigned from the group in late 1980 to join up with Mick Fleetwood's "The Visitor", a side project the Fleetwood Mac drummer was recording in Africa. After Andes returned to guest for the group's February 1981 appearance on American Bandstand, Kim Stone came in to take over bass. Everything seemed to be on track until Larry Burnett suddenly disappeared from the group, after playing a show at Miami Baseball Stadium with Heart, Blue Öyster Cult, Motörhead and Freewheel on April 19, 1981, to return to his hometown of Washington, D.C. to enter a rehab (Burnett eventually kicked a serious drug habit and after working in radio in the late 80s/early 90s, began pursuing a solo career in 2004). The group continued on to play their next show in Las Vegas without him. But after playing a concert with the band in Lahaina, Hawaii with Pure Prairie League in August of that same year, Rick Roberts announced that he also was leaving for a solo career. With the band lacking personnel and increasing in financial debt, Atlantic dropped Firefall from their roster in 1981 and released "Best of Firefall" at the close of that year.


title: Firefall

text: Since his departure from Firefall, Roberts has continued to tour on occasion. In the fall of 1981, he played dates in tandem with fellow former Burrito Brother Chris Hillman. In 1985 he was in a Twentieth Anniversary Byrds Tribute band with former Byrds Gene Clark and Michael Clarke. In 1987–89, Roberts teamed up with ex-Eagle Randy Meisner in the short lived Roberts Meisner Band, and after a return spell in Firefall (1989–1992), he was sidelined due to health issues for a number of years before returning to the road as a solo act. In the summer and fall of 2019, he toured together with fellow Firefaller Larry Burnett.


title: Firefall

text: Unhappy with the way things had turned out, Jock Bartley decided to put together a new Firefall lineup in the spring of 1982. At Ron Albert's suggestion, Bartley got together with two Miami-based musicians, Johnne Sambataro (during the '70s and '80s, he adopted the conventional spelling of John for his first name) and Chuck Kirkpatrick. Sambataro was a singer/guitarist/keyboardist/bassist/songwriter who had sung on record with Stephen Stills, Eric Clapton, Dave Mason, McGuinn, Clark & Hillman, the members of the Bee Gees and many others. Johnne and Jock had actually met back in 1978 when they both played on the Criteria sessions for Andy Gibb's platinum album "Shadow Dancing". Kirkpatrick was a singer–guitarist–keyboardist who had sung with Johnne on a number of the aforementioned sessions and had worked as an engineer at Criteria on such albums as Derek & The Dominos' "Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs". Albert then brought in Alan Jacobi, a Miami entertainment lawyer who had a relationship with Atlantic, and Jacobi convinced the label to help resign the band.


title: Firefall

text: So in the summer of 1982, Criteria sessions for the "Break of Dawn" LP began with Ron and brother Howard producing once again. Backing Bartley, Sambataro and Kirkpatrick were a number of Miami session players, with Stephen Stills and Rick Roberts making guest appearances. The album appeared in September 1982 and Bartley, Johnne and Chuck began auditioning additional players for a follow-up tour. Chuck's brother Scott (a top-notch session drummer who, like Johnne, had also played on record and toured with McGuinn, Clark & Hillman) and Colorado bassist Greg Overton were chosen and, at the last minute, David Muse decided to rejoin the band.


title: Firefall

text: In the winter of 1983, Firefall set out across the U.S. to promote "Break of Dawn". But the single from it, "Always", failed to reach the Top 40 and quickly fell off the charts.


title: Firefall

text: "Mirror of the World" followed in November 1983, the title track a comment on the effects of TV violence on children. The album had a much harder edge than its predecessors, with more of an emphasis on an '80s style synth/drum programmed production, which many of the group's fans thought reflected too great a departure from the classic Firefall sound. Though the first single, the rocking "Runaway Love", written by Bartley, Sambataro and Paul Crosta, briefly appeared in a video on MTV and received limited radio airplay, this album too failed to attract sales and quickly disappeared.


title: Firefall

text: The group, once again dropped by Atlantic, nevertheless continued to tour, headlining in smaller clubs and opening in larger venues for groups like the Beach Boys, Little River Band and Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band.


title: Firefall

text: In 1983 Overton quit (he would return briefly to play a few shows with the group in Medford, Oregon in July 1986 as a fill-in) and Muse decided to retire from touring again. Steve Hadjoupolos (sax, flute, keyboards and backing vocals) and Bob Gaffney (bass, vocals) were brought in and the group soldiered on. Sandy Ficca was brought in to take over from Scott Kirkpatrick on drums in October 1984 (Scott then returned to play some final shows with the band in June 1985 before moving on permanently) and is still with them to date.