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I liked very much the new Madonna's Interview for @InterviewMag by Mr. David Blaine, it gave me a positive vision of life, really inspiring.

#secret project. I want to start a revolution! Are you with me? Of course, I'm with you. #MDNA

An Open Letter to Madonna: Thank You, Mother to Mother The Huffington Post just published a very moving letter from columnist Cathleen Falsani to Madonna, thanking her for paving the way for people willing to adopt orphans from Malawi. Read the amazingly beautiful testimony… Dear Madonna, Thank you. Earlier this week, after a month-long sojourn in Malawi, my family arrived home in California with our newly-adopted son, Vasco Fitzmaurice Mark David Possley. His adoption would not have been possible without you and the bold actions you took in Malawi last year when its High Court denied you the adoption of your precious daughter, Chifundo “Mercy” James. You didn’t take no for an answer. You didn’t buy their argument that allowing your adoption of Mercy would encourage human trafficking. You didn’t agree when they said Mercy would be fine at an orphanage and without a loving family from a foreign land. When you appealed that myopic ruling and then won approval of Mercy’s adoption from the Malawi court of appeals, you effectively made case law that kicked open the door for other American families to adopt some of the 1 million children orphaned by HIV, AIDS and other diseases (including a grotesque indifference to the suffering of the most vulnerable among us). Your actions paved the way for families to be created across thousands of miles, through forests of diplomatic red tape and seemingly unbridgeable cultural chasms. My husband and I met Vasco in October 2007 while we were traveling in Africa on holiday. A few years earlier, we had made a donation to an organization in Blantyre that works with some of the 60,000 children who live on the streets of Malawi — the vast majority of them, as you are well aware, AIDS orphans. We were on the ground in Malawi for about 48 hours and spent most of our first day visiting with a few dozen teenaged boys — “street kids,” in the parlance of Malawi — at a drop-in center in Limbe. On our way back to the motel in Blantyre, our guide asked if we would mind making one more stop to visit a street kid that, in his words, was “just kind of special.” We drove on the road to the airport to Blantyre’s rural Chileka district, clambered down a muddy embankment and saw a clutch of mud-and-waddle huts. Our guide yelled something and we heard a squeaky boy’s voice shout something back — “I’m coming!” in Chichewa, his native language. Out came this little fellow Vasco — tiny, skinny — maybe 35 pounds soaking wet — with huge eyes and a smile that would split your heart in two. He was about eight years old but was the size of a five-year-old American child. While we visited with Vasco, who had lived alone on the streets of Blantyre for months after his mother and father had died, he sat on my lap. When he pressed his bony back into my chest, his heart was beating so violently it was shaking his little body and moving mine. I took a good look at him and noticed that he was sweating and struggling to catch his breath even though he’d been sleeping when we arrived and not running or playing. “What’s wrong with him?” I asked. “He has a hole in his heart,” we were told. With the time we had left in Malawi, my husband and I tried to get him medical attention, but there was none to be had. When we left to continue our holiday in East Africa (which we had won in a raffle — no, really), we stopped to see Vasco one last time. We hugged him close, told him that we loved him, and then we climbed back into the van and headed to the airport. As the plane took off and I looked down at the African city, I thought of the hundreds of times I’d taken off from American airports, and I knew that if Vasco were the poorest child in the U.S. — even a homeless orphan — he’d be in the hospital that night receiving the care he needed. I began to cry and then I began to wail, making a scene on the flight all the way back to Kenya. My tears were fueled by righteous anger knowing that Vasco probably would die a sinfully early death because he was poor and African. That is the worst kind of injustice. I felt impotent, helpless. Then I remembered something our family friend Bono had told me a few years earlier: “We can’t do everything, Cathleen, but what we can do we must do.” I couldn’t fix his heart myself, but I could tell his story. When we returned to Chicago, where we lived at the time, I told Vasco’s story in the pages of the Chicago Sun-Times, where I was a columnist. The piece ran on a Friday morning. By Saturday afternoon, three hospitals had offered to fix Vasco’s heart for free if we could just get him to Chicago. It took 18 months to get him to there, but on April 29, 2009, Vasco arrived in Chicago. Two weeks later, while we were in church on Mother’s Day (because God has a sense of occasion, apparently) he spiked a fever. The next day, doctors determined that he was suffering from malaria. The infection, we learned, has a two-week incubation period. Vasco had had malaria twice before in Malawi and it nearly killed him. If he had spiked the fever before he left Blantyre, he would not have been able to travel and we doubt he’d be alive today. As Vasco recuperated from malaria and a host of other parasites he’d brought with him from Malawi, surgery was pushed back for more than a month. He was staying with us in our home outside Chicago and during that time, we got to know Vasco better. We saw the amazing person that he is — incredibly bright and curious about the world, deeply intuitive and compassionate, soulful, grounded and so very funny. We also learned more about what his life would be like once he returned to Malawi with his repaired heart. That had always been the plan. Get him to Chicago, fix his heart, and send him home. It didn’t matter that we had fallen in love with him, or that he could really use a family, parents, consistent love and security. International adoption, we were told, was all but impossible. We prayed for an answer, an alternative, an escape plan and we waited, filled with equal parts hope and terror. Vasco underwent successful open-heart surgery on June 10, 2009 at Hope Children’s Hospital in Oak Lawn, Illinois, just outside Chicago. Two days later, as he was about to be moved out of intensive care and into a regular hospital room, we heard the news that the Malawi High Court of Appeal had overturned the lower court decision and approved your adoption of Mercy. Legal precedent! Case law! A miracle! A door swung open and a way had been made for us to become a legal family. It was a mitzvah created by many human (and divine) hands, including yours. Shortly after Vasco was released from the hospital, we moved to Laguna Beach, California and began the process of adopting him. First we became his legal guardians in Malawi, then came months of bureaucratic paperwork on both sides of the world. We had a home study done, got fingerprinted by the FBI, collected recommendations from friends, family, our pastor, our rabbi. You know the drill. Meanwhile, Vasco absolutely flourished. He’s grown more than six inches and put on more than 30 pounds. He enrolled in school for the first time and excelled beyond anyone’s expectations, learning English and how to read in record time, playing soccer on the town’s championship team, learning to swim and ride a bike, to snow board, skate board and even to surf. By early spring, everything was in place. We were just waiting for a court date in Malawi to make it legal. Late last month, the three of us — Vasco, my husband and I — returned to Malawi for our adoption hearing. We prayed to God for favor and mercy and tried to not to panic. Hearts in our throats, on June 1 we walked into the chambers of Judge John Chirwa at the High Court in Blantyre. The judge began reading his ruling and about half way through I began to cry tears of joy when Chirwa announced that he was legally bound by decision in the “Mercy James case” in making his ruling and, therefore, he approved our adoption. Because of Mercy. Because of you. Vasco now has a forever family. I have a beautiful, healthy, happy son — my first and only child. We are blessed and grateful beyond words. To God and to you. The blessing you helped create will not stop with us. We tell Vasco’s story to anyone who will listen, and we are creating a road map to guide other American families on their sacred journeys to adopt Malawian children who need them desperately. From the bottom of this new mother’s heart, thank you. For your generosity of heart and spirit, as well as your perseverance, bravery and chutzpah — just like the biblical Queen Esther whose name you’ve aptly taken as one of your own — thank you. You have been a mighty vessel of chisomo — grace — in our lives. And in my heart, you will always be Vasco’s fairy godmother. God bless you, Madonna. Cathleen Falsani -A -A

Sticky & Sweet Tour DVD hits #1 on amazon.com Get Sticky! Get Sweet! The time is finally here to get your copy of Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet Tour which is available on DVD and on Blu-Ray! The DVD+CD version entered the Top 25 list of Amazon.com Best Sellers in Music last week and today it just hit the #1 spot! Furthermore, it’s been 68 days in the Top 100 – quite amazing for a DVD that was released JUST today in the US! Congrats Madonna & Co! -A

Madonna ‘most played’ artist of decade in UK Madonna was the most played artist of the last decade in the UK, according to music licensing body PPL. The singer, 51, who had her first UK hit with Holiday in 1984, beat The Beatles into second place and Robbie Williams into third. Queen were fourth and Take That were fifth in the chart compiled for BBC Radio 2. It was based on plays – between 2000 and 2009 – on TV, radio and in public places including pubs, clubs and shops. Madonna was the only female solo singer to make the top 10. Girl band Sugababes, meanwhile, who entered the UK charts for the first time in 2000 with Overload, were the only act in the top 10 who emerged within the decade being scrutinised. The chart was revealed on Radio 2 show People’s Artist Chart, presented by comedian Patrick Kielty. In December, PPL announced that Snow Patrol song Chasing Cars was the most widely-played song of the decade. Last year, another chart compiled for Radio 2 – also by PPL – found that Procol Harum’s A Whiter Shade of Pale was the most played song in public places in the previous 75 years. The song, which features a distinctive organ riff, stayed at number one for six weeks in the UK in the summer of 1967. MOST-PLAYED OF THE DECADE 1. Madonna 2. The Beatles 3. Robbie Williams 4. Queen 5. Take That 6. Sugababes 7. Elton John 8. Elvis Presley 9. Abba 10. Coldplay BBC -A

Madonna talks about her new fashion line When Madonna needed inspiration for her latest fashion collection, she didn’t have to look far. The pop icon teamed up with her 13-year-old daughter Lourdes to create Material Girl, an affordable juniors’ clothing line that debuts at Macy’s this fall. This is not Madonna’s first foray into designing. In 2007, she teamed up with H&M to create a limited edition collection, M by Madonna. This time around, her venture into fashion will be long-lasting: She has launched a new company called MG ICON which, in addition to producing the juniors’ line, will also put out other collections including eyewear. The Material Girl collection includes jeans, shoes, fingerless gloves, necklaces and other accessories. Many of the pieces are inspired by Madonna and her daughter’s dance roots. Madonna recently spoke about Material Girl, her relationship with Lourdes (nicknamed Lola) and her fashion risks and regrets. AP: Why did you want to do a juniors’ line? Madonna: Lola has been bothering me for ages about designing clothes. Stella McCartney is a good friend of mine and she got her mind thinking when Lola was a little girl, about 8 years old. She started giving Lola fabrics and inviting her into her showroom and asking her opinion on things, giving her sketch books and stuff like that. Stella always pushed her. I have a lot of friends who are clothing designers whether it is Gaultier or Dolce and Gabbana. (Lola) has been around all of the shoots I have done and all of the campaigns I have done. She is always hanging out backstage. The last two tours I have done, she has been working in the wardrobe department. On this last tour she dressed all of the dancers. AP: What has Lola taught you about fashion? Madonna: I am boring basically. She reminds me of me when I was younger. She just goes for it and tries different things. It doesn’t look like she thought too much about it. That is how I used to be, but after years and years of everybody commenting on the way I look and dress and being photographed, one starts to become self-conscious and starts to plan things more. You end up judging yourself more, what looks good and what doesn’t. AP: What has it been like to work with your daughter? Madonna: It is good because she does have good taste in fashion. I respect her taste and I rarely disagree with her. AP: Was part of you hesitant about Lola designing this line as she would be thrust into the spotlight? Madonna: That is why I am here talking about the line and she is not. Eventually I will let her. I feel like she needs to get into high school and focus on her studies, her lessons. She got into the high school of the performing arts. She has a lot of work to do. I don’t want her to be distracted. She will eventually be able to talk about it. I am going to be happy when she does because she can speak much more clearly in and in a more informed way than I can about a line she is ultimately designing. I just stand in the background and go, “That’s cool. That’s not cool.” AP: The clothing is affordable. Why was it important to you to keep the price low? Madonna: When I was 13 years old, I couldn’t afford designer clothes. I couldn’t afford expensive clothing. When I designed a line of clothes for H&M, that was one of the things I liked so much about it, that it was really affordable. I think that is one of the nice things about it, that you can make nice clothes at affordable prices. AP: You are known as being a fashion risk taker. Do you ever look back and wonder, “What was I thinking?” Madonna: Yeah. I would rather not point them out. I think I had a lot of bad hair moments. In the early 80’s just sometimes I wore purple lipstick or green lipstick. Clothing-wise, I am happy about the way I dressed. AP: With your music career and with the girls’ school you are building in Malawi, was part of you hesitant about taking on another project with this clothing line? Madonna: If Lola wasn’t so completely involved in the line, designing, consulting, whatever you want to call it, I wouldn’t do it. Really she does most of the work, honestly. AP: Who are Lola’s fashion influences? Madonna: Lola spent most of her childhood growing up in England. According to her, she thinks people have more style in London, especially the boys. French boys in particular have very good style, according to Lola. I think she has been very influenced by European fashion. She is very influenced by the music she listens to, different bands she is in to. She has favorite models. She takes all kinds of dance classes. She is inspired by different items people wear as dancers whether it is a hip- hop class or a jazz class or ballet class. … Of course she is inspired by my closet. My Christian Dior shoes will go missing and then some fabulous bag I won’t be able to find or my skinny jeans, the only pair that fit me are gone. AP: Has working on this clothing line together bonded you in a different way? Madonna: I see her more as a creative person, as an artist and less as my daughter as we are working, and then every once and a while I remembered she is my daughter. Courtesy of AP -A

Madonna debuts “Material Girl” Madonna debuts a new, fast-fashion junior collection exclusively atMacy's this August called "Material Girl," and the Material Mom tells ET that her daughter Lourdes serves as her muse for the collection! "I've used fashion to make statements through my work all my life and now I have a 13-year-old daughter who's obsessed with fashion, so it seems like the natural progression of my life," she says. "If you're a Material Girl, you're a girl with a sense of humor." The Material Girl collection consists of edgy apparel, footwear, handbags and jewelry, all inspired by music and much of Madonna's early fashions, with plenty of studs, layering and lace -- and even a bustier. "I trust [Lourdes] because she has great style," Madonna tells ET, adding that her daughter makes most of the decisions about the collection. "We rarely disagree when it comes to clothes, I have to say. That's why most of my closet is being raided on a regular basis." -A

Madonna and Iconix Brand announce co-branded MDG collection MG ICON, the newly formed joint venture between Iconix Brand Group and Madonna and Guy Oseary have announced their first designer accessories collection, MDG. MDG is a sunglass collection personally designed by Madonna together with the designer-duoDomenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana. The collaboration marks Madonna's first foray into the world of eyewear and is the first co-branded project Dolce and Gabbana have done in their career. The collection will showcase the MDG logo on styles and will be manufactured by Luxottica. The collection will retail from $248 to $289 and will be carried in all Dolce & Gabbana stores worldwide, plus the Sunglass Hut chain and select opticians. The MDG collection will debut during the May market. Neil Cole, CEO and Chairman, Iconix Brand Group stated, "MDG shows the diversity and range of brands and opportunities under MG Icon umbrella. We look forward to the growth potential of this collection which aligns designing duo Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana's expertise with Madonna's vision." MG Icon LLC is a joint venture owned 50% by Iconix and 50% by an entity controlled by Madonna and Guy Oseary. MG Icon will develop and explore business initiatives globally including the creation and acquisition of brands as well as exploring opportunities within the Iconix portfolio. MG Icon holds a direct-to-retail license agreement with Macy's, Inc. for the "Material Girl" collection. "Material Girl" is a newly created, fast-fashion junior collection. Source: Iconix Brand Group, Inc. -A

The Power of Madonna Here's the cover of the "Glee: The Music - The Power of Madonna EP" that will be released on April 13 by Sony Music to accompany the upcoming episode paying tribute to Queen of Pop, directed by series creator Ryan Murphy, that will air on FOX on April 20. The songs included in “Glee: The Music – The Power of Madonna EP” are: Express Yourself Borderline / Open Your Heart Vogue Like A Virgin 4 Minutes What It Feels Like For A Girl Like A Prayer -A

Finally The Official Madonna App on iTunes!!!! An official Madonna App has finally landed on the iTunes App Store. Developed through the Mobile Roadie platform and available in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese and Spanish language, the application is compatible with iPhone and iPod touch and requires iPhone OS 3.0 or later. "Official Madonna" is available for free - check it out on your iTunes App Store now. Thanks to Giovanni and Madonna Tribe. -A

Madonna, the myth, the music What with all her many talents and incarnations we could almost overlook Madonna's primary career as a musician. A career that is a triumph of style and substance as demonstrated by how skillfully she has taken on new music genres and new looks... all the while remaining true to herself and her best design allies. While Madonna's music career has always been an everchanging affair (and has gone from strength to strength for that very reason) but some elements have accompanied it all along. One of these is her longtime collaboration with the designer duo whose main line she has become the face of,Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana. The friendship and professional relationship goes way back and over the past decade the designers' contribution was greater than ever. On tours, on covers and in videos. We might be feeling all excited by the new S/S 2010 images but the sight of Madonna in Dolce and Gabbana's designs is hardly a novelty. Take the Music era and these exclusive sketches especially thought up for the occasion. In keeping with the mood, fearlessly sexy and unapologetically decked in bling. Two exclusive sketches designed for Music's Madonna. The marvellously embellished one-off jacket by Dolce & Gabbana which captured just what the album was about. Further along the styling and tunes became resolutely more lighthearted and retro but yet again the designers' left their mark as seen on occasion of Confessions on a Dancefloor. A logical choice of D&G, their younger, more flirtatious line for a fresh, flirtatious album. Yet more recently, though before she become the most natural incarnation of the Italian housewife, the collaboration took a very strong and sexy turn first seen in the Hard Candy showcases (three exclusive dates in NYC, London and Paris prior to the Sticky & Sweet tour). This time it was black and the flirtation was most definitely a thing of the past. Corset tops, blouses with just a healthy injection of feminine lace (Madonna does strong very well but never to the expense of femininity), stunning tailored jackets lined in hot pink... Acessorised with the all important throne suit for her Madgesty. Madonna is Swide's not-so-secret crush (we go way back) and we cannot get enough of the latest campaign. We never looked this good while doing the dishes... Source: Swide -A

Campaign exclusive: Madonna is the ultimate poster girl A SWIDE EXCLUSIVE! Never-seen-before shots from Dolce & Gabbana's S/S 10 campaign with added backstage snaps; Madonna keeps surprising us, this time by inventing a new form of exercise. Housekeeping is the new yoga. Yoga and Pilates may have been the darlings of the past two decades but for those always looking for the next thing then here is an avant-gout of things to come. The creme de la creme of the A-list are cleverly multitasking by getting on with the daily grind while maintaining their fabulous physiques. Exclusive shots from Dolce & Gabbana's S/S 10 campaign. Madonna is the poster girl for this new movement as seen in the exclusive new shots from Dolce & Gabbana's Spring Summer 2010 campaign. See how it's done by the pros: broomsticks are for stretching (and while doing so keeping your hydration levels high is a must) but don't underestimate the power of freshly cleaned intimates to take breathing exercises to the next level. Should this form of exercise be too soft for you then get your heart beating faster by reading old love letters in the privacy of your bedroom... Exclusive behind-the-scenes photos: Steven Klein in action (top) and hanging out on set with Madonna and Domenico Dolce (above). Take another look at the campaign on its official page! Source: Dolce & Gabbana Photo credits: Steven Klein for Dolce & Gabbana Backstage courtesy of Dolce&Gabbana