http://www.fishtankensemble.com/news.html FishtankEnsemble.com features news and information about the musical group, Fishtank Ensemble. en-us http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.html PRELIMINARY TOUR SCHEDULE. A list of cities and a few confirmed bookings for the 2006 West Coast Tour have been announced. Some details are still being worked out. November 2 Redding, CA November 3 Chico, CA November 4 Mount Shasta, CA November 5 Portland (East Portland), OR Nov. 6 - 9 Corvalis OR, Olympia WA, Seattle WA November 10 Bellingham, WA November 11 Seattle (Ballard), WA Nov. 12 - 14 To be arranged: WA and OR Novermber 15 Blue Lake, CA (near Arcata) November 16 Garberville, CA Nov. 17 - 30 To be arranged: central CA December 2 Berkeley, CA December 3 Felton, CA (near Santa Cruz) December 5 San Diego, CA December 6 Hollywood, CA December 7 Los Angeles (Altadena), CA Dec. 8 - Feb. 9 To be arranged: southern CA Feb. 10, 2007 Phoenix, AZ Feb. 17, 2007 Claremont, CA See the Shows Page for details. Schedule subject to change. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.html 2006 WEST COAST TOUR planned to start in November. While the schedule is still being drawn up, the preliminary plan is: November -- Northern California and the Pacific Northwest December -- Southern California Jan.-Feb. -- Central California and Southwest Stay tuned for list of cities and dates. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/ezra/index.html URSULA'S NEW BABY!!! Ezra James Scott Martinez was born on March 6 at 4:35 pm in France. Fabrice reports that baby and mother are fine, and looking relieved that this project is finally over. Little Ezra did his first sound check and is reported to be crying on key, then was put to bed snugly in an open violin case. It's suspected that he already knows all the lyrics to Fishtank's songs and will sing before he can talk. Click link for photos. By the way, Ezra's Zodiac sun sign is Pisces--the sign of the two fishes, of course. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/faq.html#more_music HIATUS. Fishtank are taking a break while Ursula has her baby. Fabrice and Ursula have returned to Europe, but will be in the USA again next fall. Check back in late summer for more scheduled Fishtank shows. Meanwhile, you can catch the other members of Fishtank in their solo acts and side projects, including: Duckmandu, El Douje, Estradasphere and God of Shamisen. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/release2.html TIM SMOLENS IS BACK! Bassist Tim Smolens has rejoined Fishtank Ensemble. See the the recent press release for more details. NEW SUPER RAOUL EDITION. A new edition of Fishtank's CD, Super Raoul, has just been released. It features a much livelier cover: the cartoon of the band that used to be inside is now on the front. It also has lettering that you can actually and improved sound on a couple of tracks. The old one was selling very well, but the new cover is more fun and engaging, which makes it a better fit with the band. But hang on to your copy of the old, limited edition--it will be a collector's item some day! CD RELEASE PARTY. Don't miss Fishtank on January 12 at the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley! This will be the last chance to see them until next fall, because Fabrice and Ursula are returning to Europe as they do every summer. (Also, as many of you know, Ursula is expecting a baby. So this really is the last chance to see Fishtank for a while.) http://www.fishtankensemble.com/ From the band: "Happy holidays from Fishtank Ensemble! Thanks to all our fans for making 2005 a terrific year. We appreciate everyone who came to a show, bought Super Raoul, or told someone about our music. We look forward to seeing you in the New Year. We're starting 2006 off with a show January 8 in Felton and a big show January 12 at the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley. See you there!" http://www.fishtankensemble.com/news.html WEBRING. This site is helping to launch the "Balkan Music USA Webring", linking sites that promote Balkan music in the USA. Check out the navigation box on the main page (located in hte lower right-hand corner). If you are a webmaster of such a site, please click on the "Home/Join" link to find out how you site can join. Help bring the world of Balkan music closer together! POLL. What's your favorite Fishtank Ensemble song? Want to find out what other people think? The the subject of our first survey. A page for taking public opinon polls has been added (click on the "Polls" link on the main page). We are looking foward to hear from you! http://www.fishtankensemble.com/ringtone.html FREE RINGTONES You can now download cellular phone ringtones of Fishtank Ensemble music from http://www.fishtankensemble.com/ringtone.html . This program is a beta, so please send your feedback to the Webmaster. SIGN UP FOR CELL PHONE TEXT MESSAGES. You can now sign up to have reminders about Fishtank Ensemble shows in your area sent as text messages to your cellular phone. Your cell phone must support SMS messaging, and currently we only support USA residents (sorry, rest of the world!). Go to the the Contact page to sign up. RSS FEED. This news page and the shows page are now available as an RSS (version 0.91) feed: News: http://www.fishtankensemble.com/news.rss Shows: http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.rss This means that the information you are reading will be avaiable from on-line news aggregators such as my.userland.com, xmltree.com, feedbucket.com, feedalot.com, feedreader.net, feedfeeds.com, 2rss.com, or by installing an aggregator plug-in in your browser. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/download.html You can now download "Suite Romaine" (or if you prefer: "Suite Roumaine") for FREE. The "Download Song" link on the main page will take you to a download page. The band would like to know how you hear about them, so please answer the little mini-survey if you have time. Then download and enjoy the song! http://www.toids.org Last night Fishtank played to a packed house at the Starry Plough, a nice Irish pub in South Berkeley, and left them dancing in front of the stage. The lucky crowd got to hear both Fishtank and the Toids (http://www.toids.org), an wonderful, incredibly authentic- sounding group. It's not just any bill that can fill a room on a Thursday night in December in the pouring rain. Today the band leaves for the Southern Californian leg of their tour. We wish them a good trip and better weather! http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/fishtank HAPPY THANKSGIVING, FISHTANK FANS! The new CD, Super Raoul, is for sale on-line now at CDbaby.com (see link). If you haven't bought from CD Baby before, it is very easy to place an order. Quantities in stock are limited so don't delay. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.html Some great new shows have been added to the January schedule: Saturday, December 3, 2006 at Technomania Circus in San Diego, CA. Sunday, January 8, 2006 at Don Quixote's Restarant in Felton, CA. Tuesday, January 12, 2006 at Freight and Salvage in Berkeley, CA. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/news.html Fishtank Ensemble played to a packed house last night in Portland, with people turned away at the door! And the new CD, Super Raoul, has been selling like hot cakes, with over 20 copies sold at this one show! Super Raoul will be on sale at CDbaby.com by the end of the week. Sorry about the delay, folks! Please don't give up--it's worth waiting for! http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.html There have been some changes to the tour schedule: (1) The Garberville show has been moved from Briceland to the Mateel Community Center in Redway; (2) the show at the Tangier Grill in Silverlake (in Los Angeles) which was to take place on Nov. 8, has been rescheduled to an earlier date, Nov. 5. Latest updates will always be available on the FishtankEnsemble.com website. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.html The new CD, Super Raoul, was delayed in production, but it looks like it will just make it in time. The latest word is that it will be for sale at all the shows, and for sale on the Web in about a week. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/shows.html Preliminary schedule for the 2005 WEST COAST TOUR has been announced! So far shows have been scheduled for: Santa Cruz, CA -- Nov. 3 Berkeley, CA -- Nov. 4 Cottage Grove OR -- Nov. 8 Olympia, WA -- Nov. 10 Seattle WA -- Nov. 13 Portland OR -- Nov. 15 Eugene OR -- Nov. 16 Ashland, OR -- Nov. 17 Berkeley, CA -- Dec. 1 Los Angeles, CA -- Dec. 4, 6, 8 See the link for the latest official schedule, and please check back for more details. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/records.html BIG NEWS! The new Fishtank Ensemble CD, Super Raoul, is finally finished. It will be released in November to coincide with the 2005 West Coast Tour planned for this fall. All tour dates have not been finalized as of this writing, but are expected to include the Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle areas as well as several other cities. Stay tuned for further announcements. http://www.fishtankensemble.com/bio.html Fishtank Ensemble member Kevin Kmetz has won the prestigious Hirosaki Shamisen Championship Tournament in Hirosaki, Japan. Competing against hundreds of other Tsuguru-style shamisen players, Kevin won top prize in individual class, becoming the first foreigner ever to win an award at Hirosaki. The story was widely reported in the Japanese press. Congratulation, Kevin!