hFriends sing praises of Ray Charles at funeral

hFriends sing praisesof Ray Charles at funeral
LOS ANGELES -- Blues legend B.B. King reacts as he performs at the funeral service for music legend Ray Charles at the First African American Episcopal Church in Los Angeles. King, Glen Campbell, Stevie Wonder and Wynton Marsalis performed musical tributes to Charles, who died last week at 73, during a joyous service Friday.
Charles' son, the Rev. Robert Robinson Sr., started the service with a rousing tone, clapping his hands throughout a reading from the Old Testament. Then the Rev. Jesse Jackson added a New Testament reading threaded with his own inspirational message.
"Now heaven has a maestro," Jackson said. "Ray, when you first get there, before you meet Count [Basie], before you meet Duke [Ellington], before you meet family and friends, there's a man over there, across the river who is giving sight to the blind!"
King, who played a mournful ballad on his guitar, held back tears as he paid tribute to Charles.
"He's a genius," King said. "One of the greatest musicians I ever met."
Sad Father's Day
APOPKA, Fla. -- A soldier who kept his scheduled return home secret for a Father's Day surprise was killed along with two other soldiers in a mortar attack in Iraq, officials and family members said Friday.
Sgt. Arthur Stacey Mastrapa, 35, of Apopka, died Wednesday in Balad, Iraq, when mortar rounds hit his camp, according to the Department of Defense.
Mastrapa, whose unit was scheduled to return to the United States on Friday, had hoped to surprise his family. "He wanted to surprise me for Father's Day," said his father, Arthur Mastrapa, 61. "He was a joy to have around -- a very good, happy person."
Mastrapa was a member of the Army Reserve's 351st Military Police Company, based in Ocala.
Mastrapa, who had a wife and two children, worked as a postal carrier.
Astronaut becomes dad
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Space station astronaut Mike Fincke was listening in from orbit Friday when he got the good news: It's a girl.
His wife, Renita Fincke, gave birth to their second child at a Houston-area hospital -- just two days before Father's Day. The astronaut was connected via a NASA-arranged radio hookup to his wife's cell phone in the delivery room, a family friend said.
NASA officials said it was the first time to their knowledge that a U.S. astronaut was in space during the birth of his child.
The couple named the girl Tarali Paulina. Fincke proudly informed Mission Control that Tara -- the first two syllables of the name -- means "star" in the Indian dialect of his wife's family. Their son, who is not quite 3, is named Chandra, which means "moon."
"My wife had already given me the moon, now she's given me a star," he said.
Rap video made in jail
ATLANTA -- A best-selling rapper filmed an unauthorized video at the Fulton County Jail while out on work release from another jail, embarrassed county officials said.
Part of a video for rapper Clifford Harris, whose stage name is T.I., was shot Thursday night, authorities said.
Harris was serving jail time in neighboring Cobb County on a probation violation when he received permission to leave the jail to make the tape at the Fulton jail, Cobb County Chief Deputy Sheriff Lynda Coker said.
A spokesman for Fulton County Sheriff Jackie Barrett said she had no idea a rap video was being filmed inside the 3,200-inmate jail. Deputies apparently allowed "four or five" men up to the seventh floor with a hand-held camcorder, Barrett said. Barrett said the deputies would be disciplined.
Miraculous statue?
GENOA, Italy -- Thousands of people flocked to see a bronze statue of Christ in Genoa after a woman said she saw the face of Italian saint Padre Pio on the statue's chest.
The archbishop of Genoa inspected the statue and then said it could be returned next week to its home on the sea bed off San Fruttuoso, about 15 miles south of Genoa, local official Alfio Barbagallo said Friday.
Barbagallo attributed the alleged vision to plays of light or stains on the body of the statue.
Associated Press