LOCAL NEWS

Musicians to grace Cades Cove today Ellie Grace, a singer, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and clog dancer will entertain visitors to Great Smoky Mountains National Park with her extraordinary talents during a premiere performance at Cades Cove on Thursday, July 27, at 8 p.m. Grace’s performances include a compelling mix of music and dance that is strongly rooted in tradition but crosses easily into the contemporary folk realm, ranging from the sweetest of songs to playing old-time instrumentals. Grace has over 20 years of experience performing, choreographing and teaching clogging, Irish stepdancing, and tap. She plays the mandolin, fiddle, and guitar and has recorded three albums with The Grace Family. Participants should bring two soup spoons per person to join Ms. Grace in a hands-on demonstration of playing “spoons.” Also bring a lawn chair to the event which will be held in the amphitheater at Cades Cove, between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. Kids bass tournament Saturday The 16th Annual Mountain Music Invitational Kids Bass Tournament is going on Saturday at Douglas Dam Lake. There will be free food, drinks and games for all registered children and their parents. Registration for the event begins at 11 a.m. There’s a registration fee of $30 per team. Swim lessons available for children at city pool The City of Knoxville will hold a two-week session of American Red Cross swim lessons at Ed Cothren Pool, located at 1737 Reynolds St., from July 31-August 11. This “Learn to Swim” program will teach children between the ages of six and 10 the fundamentals of swimming. Children will receive a certificate at the end of the program if they attend at least eight of the ten sessions. Classes will run Monday through Friday, from 11:00 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. Cost per child is $20. To register your child, call Kristen Manuel at 215-1406. ORNL’s Bardayan among nation’s top young scientists Daniel Bardayan of Oak Ridge National Laboratory has received a Department of Energy Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), presented today in a White House ceremony. Bardayan, who studies nuclear astrophysics in ORNL’s Physics Division, is being cited for his pioneering work at ORNL’s Holifield Radioactive Ion Beam Facility toward understanding stellar explosions. Bardayan, a native of Nashville, first came to ORNL in 1996 as a graduate student. He held a postdoctoral appointment at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a two-year Eugene P. Wigner postdoctoral research fellowship at ORNL before joining the lab research staff in 2003. He received his master’s and doctorate degrees from Yale University and did his undergraduate work at Tennessee Technological University in Cookeville.