Dean Goodman

Clarence Clemons, the burly saxophone player who played a crucial role in shaping Bruce Springsteen's early sound, died on Saturday.

In a major Grammys upset, rock band Arcade Fire won the coveted album of the year on Sunday, helping reduce contender Eminem to also ran status.

Eclectic rocker Neil Young, who has made no secret of his disdain for the Grammys, finally won a coveted trophy on Sunday for the first time.

Michael Jackson was laid to rest on Thursday at a funeral attended by family and celebrities, more than two months after the pop star died at age 50.

A year after her disastrous comeback attempt at the MTV Video Music Awards, Britney Spears swept the event on Sunday.

British pop singer Amy Winehouse, whose rapid descent from promising newcomer to emaciated junkie played out in the full glare of the public eye last year, took home five Grammy awards on Sunday. The Soweto Gospel Choir won a second Grammy for their album African Spirit.

If a movie wins a Golden Globe, but there's no ceremony, does the prize still count? That's the issue faced by the Hollywood studios behind such films as Atonement and Sweeney Todd, which lost their moments of glory on Sunday to the Hollywood writers strike.

The Golden Compass, a costly fantasy starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig, got off to a slow start at the North American box office and will likely fall short of opening-weekend expectations. New Line Cinema's -million film sold an estimated ,8-million worth of tickets during its first day in theatres on Friday.

United States film and television writers started going on strike on Monday as last-minute talks aimed at averting the Writers Guild of America's first strike in almost two decades collapsed. The strike is expected to shut down many sitcoms and send popular late-night talk shows immediately into reruns.

Keith Richards may never have met a drug he didn't like, but on Wednesday the Rolling Stones guitarist denied mixing his father's ashes with cocaine and snorting the ghoulish concoction. Richards caused an international uproar on Tuesday when he was quoted as saying: ''The strangest thing I've tried to snort? My father.''

The Dixie Chicks, who stirred up a hornet's nest with a jibe at United States President George Bush, won all five Grammys for which they were nominated on Sunday. The victory marked a stunning validation for the female country music trio from Texas, almost four years after their dream run as the darlings of Nashville came to an abrupt end.

As the intrepid Kazakhstan journalist Borat Sagdiyev might say, Borat make glorious entrance at Hollywood office of movies. Indeed, Borat -- the acclaimed comedy tracing the Jew-fearing title character's road trip across the United States -- stunned observers by opening at number one on Sunday with ticket sales of ,4-million.