The halls are alive with the sound of music in Henrico County’s schools. For the 10th consecutive year, the school system has been named one of the best communities for music education by the nonprofit NAMM Foundation, which rates schools on funding, graduation requirements, music class participation, instruction time, facilities, support for the music program and other factors.

Brown to off-on local shows to price changes at iTunes   It has been one of those ping-ponging weeks in entertainment.  First, Chris Brown softly uttered a “not guilty’ plea in a Los Angeles court Monday. No surprise there. It’s tough to chase a plea bargain—which Brown’s lawyers have been trying to hammer out —if you admit your guilt to a judge.

LAS VEGAS (AP)—Jamey Johnson took home song of the year honors and Rascal Flatts won their seventh in a row for top vocal group at the Academy of Country Music Awards, but Sunday’s ceremony was highlighted by performances that ranged from extravagant to poignant, perhaps none more so than John Rich’s angry anthem “Shuttin’ Detroit Down.“

The Rolling Stones and Dave Matthews Band have been there – and now U2 will truck a massive, in-the-round stage into University of Virginia’s Scott Stadium this fall.

Concerts by rapper Busta Rhymes and saxophonist Maceo Parker scheduled for this weekend might be canceled as Toad’s Place remains closed.

Expectations were unbelievably high. Phish had not performed since Aug. 15, 2004. Tickets were in such demand that the $50 face value was inflated to at least $300—and up to $900 per ticket on the Internet. It would have been very difficult to find someone at the end of the concert Friday at the Hampton Coliseum who felt their time and money was not well spent. By any fan’s standard, the band came through in a big way. The show was massive even by Phish’s own very demanding standards: 32 songs, just under four hours and a set list that was guaranteed to sate the most rabid fan.

Chris Brown briefly appeared in court yesterday, hours after he was charged with two felonies stemming from what a police detective described as a brutal argument between the singer and his girlfriend, Rihanna.

It’s almost beside the point that “Jonas Brothers: The 3-D Concert Experience” is well made. Millions of Jonas Brothers fans would flock to it even if it were shot on cell phones. Kevin, Joe and Nick Jonas have a wholesome, youthful appeal that drives their almost exclusively pubescent female audience wild. One of the pleasures of the movie is the way it captures the peculiar sociological phenomenon of mass teenage adulation—the screams, the outstretched arms, the hyperventilation and even the fainting from excitement.

Ticketmaster agreed yesterday to change its online sales process after it directed people seeking Bruce Springsteen tickets to a subsidiary that charged up to 50 times the face value.

LOS ANGELES—A tearful Jennifer Hudson won her first Grammy, thanking her family “in heaven and those who are with me today” to kick off an evening already stoked with drama when police said they were investigating double nominee Chris Brown in an alleged assault on an unidentified woman. Brown, a native of Tappahannock, Va., and long-time girlfriend Rihanna, each nominated and slated to perform, separately dropped out of the Grammys at the last minute, and their whereabouts were not immediately known last night. The victim of Brown’s alleged assault wasn’t identified, and it wasn’t immediately clear whether Rihanna’s absence was related to Brown’s.

A complete list of winners at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards.

Times-Dispatch Music Critic Melissa Ruggieri blogged live from the Grammy Awards. Check out her take on what happened and the backstage interviews.

The comeback of New Kids on the Block continues this spring with a March 18 stop at the Richmond Coliseum. Last year, the mega-popular ‘80s boy band of Donnie Wahlberg, Joey McIntyre, Jordan Knight, Jonathan Knight and Danny Wood reunited for a tour and a new album, “The Block.“

James Holden, a Virginia State University music instructor, will conduct the African-American Jazz Caucus/Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Student All-Star Big Band performance on Sunday, Feb.1 in Harlem, NY. The All-Star Band is composed of students from jazz programs at Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Holden, director of the VSU Gospel Chorale, will lead the All-Star Band alongside James Patterson, of Clark Atlanta University and Robert Trowers of North Carolina Central University.

The road never ends for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. Though the venerable group just played the Richmond Coliseum five months ago, they’ll return to the area for a Charlottesville date at 7:30 p.m. May 5.