Buckingham Palace issues video with message as key royal steps up duty
King Charles III’s younger brother Prince Edward thrilled royal fans with his surprising visit to a beautiful garden after stepping up his royal duties amid the monarch’s health crisis.
Buckingham Palace honoured the Duke of Edinburgh as he visited to YourSpace Sutton Community Garden.
Prince Edward, as Patron of the London Gardens Society, has been involved in various garden visits and events throughout the year.
The Palace released the stunning video of the key royal’s outing to the royal family’s official Instagram and wrote: “Visiting wonderful gardens of The London Gardens Society!”
The statement continued: “As Patron of the London Gardens Society, The Duke visited YourSpace Sutton Community Garden and the garden at The Baitul Futuh Mosque.”
It added: “In Sutton, His Royal Highness met volunteers as well as representatives from Alzheimer’s Support Group, Tennyson Care Home residents and @dofeuk participants, all of whom utilise the community garden.
“At the mosque, The Duke planted an English Rose Bush to honour the mosque’s green legacy, before presenting them an award for the ‘Best Display of Annual Plants and Flowers’.”
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are tipped to make a major comeback after their crumbling Netflix deal, according to a PR expert. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex signed a multi-million-pound deal, reportedly worth around £12million, with the streaming giant in 2020, shortly after their sensational departure from the Royal Family.
So far, the Sussexes have produced five projects for Netflix, but apart from their first eponymous docuseries, released in 2022, the rest have failed to gain the viewers’ interest, consistently ranking low in various charts. As their contract expires in September, reports claimed that the streamer will not be looking to renew it, which was seen as a huge blow to the couple’s income stream.
But a PR expert has told us that Harry and Meghan can still “reinvent” themself despite the setback.
Edward Coram-James, CEO of Go Up, told the Express that the Montecito couple can still negotiate various deals with other market competitors because their names still attract “interest worldwide.”
He explained: “The Sussexes’ joint brand is tarnished, but they still command enormous interest worldwide.
They’ve alienated both traditional royal supporters and progressive audiences who initially championed them.
“Their global fame is enormous, and they can still reinvent and attract new deals.”
The PR expert even suggested that the Duchess could return to acting and urged the public not to “count them out”.
He said: “Netflix’s loss might be someone else’s gain, Apple TV+, Amazon, or even a return to more traditional media, such as acting, for Meghan.
Shilpa Rao is a seasoned Indian singer who got recognition in Pakistan after singing Coke Studio song Paar Channa De with the rock band Noori. The song was released 8 years ago and it has so far garnered 34 million views on YouTube. The song was a blend of classical and rock music featuring the regional love story of Soni Mahiwal. Pakistani and Indian music lovers praised the song.
Nowadays, a clip of Paar Channa De singer is doing rounds on social media in which her jealous tone for Coke Studio Pakistan is under scrutiny.
On The Lallantop Show host’s question, “Why is Pakistani Coke Studio better than Indian one?” She replied, “For them, that is what the whole year is, that is their main thing. Coke Studio is not our main thing in India. There is another reason behind this, we should celebrate our desi culture more like South Indians who use all their desi beats proudly” Here is the link to the video:
Social media users have been heavily criticizing Shilpa Rao for her jealous remarks about Pakistani Coke Studio. Netizens from multiple nationalities, including Africa, India, and Bangladesh, are also calling her out for her apparent jealousy. One user said, “As an African, I never realized how jealous India is of Pakistan.” Another stated, “As a Bangladeshi, when it comes to music, poetry, fast bowling, drama, and the air force, Pakistan always rocks.” An Indian added, “I’m Indian, but I can proudly say nothing is better than Coke Studio Pakistan in terms of music.” A fan wrote, “Jealousy at its peak.” A Bangladeshi fan shared, “As a Bangladeshi, I’ve noticed that all the talented people are in Pakistan—actors, singers. Pakistan is full of talented individuals. When it comes to music and drama, Pakistani content hits differently.” A Pakistani commented, “This isn’t even our main thing. We produce music all year round for dramas. Each of our dramas has its own original soundtrack.” Read the comments:
Former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has sparked dating rumors with pop star Katy Perry after the two were seen dining together in Montreal and later attending her concert in the city. The speculation follows several videos posted by concertgoers showing Trudeau enthusiastically singing along to Perry’s hit song “Firework” during her Lifetimes tour stop over the weekend.
The viral footage, originally posted by TikTok user @avocado6713, shows Trudeau fully immersed in the performance, leading many to joke that he may be a “secret KatyCat,” referring to the nickname for Perry’s devoted fanbase.
Though neither party has issued a public statement about their relationship status, the internet has been quick to speculate. Perry is currently separated from actor Orlando Bloom, with whom she shares a child, while Trudeau finalized his divorce from Sophie Grégoire Trudeau in early 2024. Their recent public appearances have fueled curiosity about whether their connection is romantic or simply friendly.
Despite the unexpected nature of the pairing, cultural observers have noted some surprising similarities between the two. As pointed out by Joan Summers in a piece for Vulture, both Trudeau and Perry have faced past criticism over cultural appropriation and have become recurring figures in viral media coverage—from BuzzFeed listicles to meme culture.
While it remains unclear whether this is a budding relationship or just an amusing coincidence, their sightings in Montreal have undeniably placed them at the center of pop culture chatter.
Four years ago, Tyler Perry’s stepfather offered him a job in the office of his dog-training company in Portsmouth, Rhode Island. Perry had little else to fill his time: he was 29 and living in his mother’s basement, uncertain what he should do with the rest of his life.
In 2017, he had left Berklee College of Music, where he had ostensibly studied songwriting, but largely smoked weed and skipped class. The songs he wrote then were introspective and folk-driven, in the lineage of Nick Drake and Elliott Smith – artists he had been drawn to in his senior year of high school, who had spoken to him just as depression had first set in. “I was depressed for, like, 10 years,” he says.
In idle moments in the office, he would scour Craigslist, imagining a different life in New York or Nashville or LA. One day, on a whim, he applied for a recruitment job at a commercial real estate company in Los Angeles. He lied about his experience, and the fact he didn’t have a degree. “I just wrote a really good email,” he says. “And 20 minutes later they called me. I went through two interviews in a day, and then they said: ‘Can you be here in two weeks?’” Perry had never been to Los Angeles. That evening, he talked it over with his family and friends. “And my mom said: ‘What do you have to lose? A few thousand dollars? You can always come back.’ So I moved to Venice Beach, California.”
In a clip of Perry that began to circulate online last autumn, the singer was filmed at Eagle Rock bar The Fable performing Help Me Out – a song that longs for self-acceptance the way one might yearn for a lover. He moves around the stage with a sensuous majesty, a large man in triple denim, flicking his hair, courting the mic stand, his voice moving effortlessly from earth-deep to celestial. There is something of Elvis and Roy Orbison and Harry Nilsson; the kind of easy, confident performance that feels like alchemy.
In person, Perry is a faintly beatific presence, sitting in a Brighton cafe in the gap between shows at the city’s Great Escape festival. He speaks gently, his conversation ranging from the suburbs of Rhode Island to the free kombucha at WeWork via countercultural philosopher Alan Watts’s thoughts on ego. What quickly becomes clear is the distance between the solid assurance of Perry’s stage self and the more tentative man sitting across the table.
Before all of this – before the dog-training office and the real estate application – Perry had begun working with a counsellor and dietician named Courtney Huard. For a couple of years the pair worked on improving Perry’s sense of body positivity and mental health, and the impact was immense. “She was an incredible person and I’m really lucky I came across her,” Perry says. Around the same time, he discovered the work of self-help teacher Eckhart Tolle and his book The Power of Now, and took an Enneagram personality test. “I pinned my personality to a wall, and I got to see it for the first time,” he says. “And it shocked me out of depression. I had this kind of spiritual awakening.”
The problem was that this newly awakened Perry did not fit quite so well with his catalogue of melancholy folk songs. For years, when he played live, he had hidden behind his guitar, his voice flat and whispered. “I was wanting to be ‘cool’ in that sense of ‘mystical, can’t grasp it …’” he says. “But I don’t think that’s necessarily me.”
In California, he lived out of a suitcase, worked for the property company in the day, and at night played open mics across the city. Mostly he would play a couple of his own folk songs, and then a cover of Roy Orbison’s Crying. It was this last song that hit the sweet spot. “People would freak out, and it would be like it was my birthday,” he says. “Everybody in the place looking at me and clapping.”
He realised that covering Orbison’s song called on the skills he had first learned doing musical theatre in high school: a supported singing voice, a sense of generosity and occasion. Perry wondered if this might be a new direction for him – one that drew on all of his musical loves, from showtunes to Fleet Foxes, via Jonathan Richman and the Who’s 1969 rock opera, Tommy. He dreamed up a character for himself, called it Tyler Ballgame – a nod to the nickname of legendary Boston Red Sox baseball player, Ted Williams, and a joking put-down to himself, a man who had spent years squandering his talent in his mother’s basement, being the very opposite of a sporting legend. He set about working out how this Tyler Ballgame might write and perform.
At Berklee, Perry had attended a performance studies class taught by Livingston Taylor (brother of singer-songwriter James Taylor). The classes were held in a theatre, and on the first day, Taylor invited each of his 40 students to stand on the stage. You had to go up and hold your palms out to the audience, and shift your weight from one foot to the other in time, and look everybody in the eye.It struck Perry as brilliant.
In Los Angeles, Perry remembered the class, and it struck him as an act of radical presence; something Tyler Ballgame might do. He started to try it in his live shows. “I’d reach out to the audience and look them in the eye. Like, we’re both here to do something. I’m trying to connect, and we’re going to live this experience together.” The songs came with an ease. Soulful, and sad sometimes, but also brimming with something hopeful and alive. They carried the richness and simplicity of the classics.
Perry relocated to East Los Angeles, began collaborating with other neighbouring musicians, and playing live as much as he could. One day, the producer Jonathan Rado, famed for his work with Miley Cyrus and the Killers, happened to see an Instagram story of a Tyler Ballgame show and contacted him. The singer went over to Rado’s studio shortly afterwards and over the next couple of weeks, the pair recorded more than an album’s worth of material.
Word of Tyler Ballgame soon spread, and by last autumn, record labels had begun making fevered bids to sign him. In the end, Perry went with the British independent Rough Trade, connecting with them over a shared love of Nick Drake and Arthur Russell. “I had a lot of options and it was really flattering and really crazy,” he says, “but I just kept coming back to Rough Trade, because of that kindred spirit of whatever music I make naturally, in my soul, they already love, because they’ve already put out all the music that I love.”
Perry makes for easy company, and after an hour and a half of conversation I ask if there is anything else he might like to tell me. “I don’t know,” he says slowly, and hesitates. “Maybe I’d like to mention my counsellor, Courtney, again,” he says. “She had her life taken, really horrifically.” Huard was killed by her husband, who later killed himself. Perry learned of her death when a friend sent him a news article from his local newspaper back in Rhode Island. Perry saw the photograph and was stunned.
At that precise moment he had been writing Help Me Out, a song largely inspired by Huard. “She made me realise your value is not tied to the size of your body, or how people look at you – things which had kept me from even being on stage at all.
“There are so many people on the messageboards of her funeral posts and her obituary saying: ‘She set me on the course of my life.’ She was a really special person, and it just shows how precious life is. So I live for her.”
It is a hot afternoon, but Perry takes to the stage at the UnBarred Brewery wearing a woollen jumper. He looks out to the crowd, gently spreads his palms, and begins to sing. It is a golden performance, the songs sounding almost as if they have always existed, and Perry entirely mesmerising.
As he plays, I think of something he told me over lunch – about the freedom and fluidity of performance. “I want to be totally in the flow state, like gone,” he said. “Where nothing is canned or prepared or contrived.”
Some shows, he told me, you get it, and the rest of the band get it, and the audience gets it, too. “And then it’s like real magic. It’s a celebration of the joy of performance and the joy of music.” Today as Perry and the band play, the air is filled with a kind of joy – with something like real magic in the warmth of a Sussex afternoon.
Tyler Ballgame’s new single New Car is out now. He plays the End of the Road festival, nr Blandford Forum, 30 August, and The Lexington, London, 10 September.
The deadline for the 2026 competition, which will offer USD 110,000 in prize money, instrument loans from the Rin Collection, and performance opportunities, is now 15 August
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The application deadline for the Singapore International Violin Competition (SIVC) has been extended to 15 August 2025.
Open to violinists under 30 worldwide, the 2026 competition will be held from 24 January to 7 February at the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music, National University of Singapore.
Contestants will play for prizes totalling USD 110,000 in cash, fine violin loans from the Rin Collection, and prestigious performance opportunities. The monetary prize breakdown is as follows:
First Prize: USD 50,000
Second Prize: USD 25,000
Third Prize: USD 15,000
Fourth Prize: USD 6,000
Fifth Prize: USD 5,000
Sixth Prize: USD 4,000
The competition is also calling for new solo violin works of around five to six minutes to be considered for the competition’s commissioned work. The submission deadline is 31 August 2025, and SGD 5,000 (USD 3,800) will be awarded to the selected composer.
The SIVC has been held every three years since its inception in 2014. Previous winners include Dmytro Udovychenko in 2022 and Sergei Dogadin in 2018.
More information can be found here.
In The Best of Technique you’ll discover the top playing tips of the world’s leading string players and teachers. It’s packed full of exercises for students, plus examples from the standard repertoire to show you how to integrate the technique into your playing.
In the second volume of The Strad’s Masterclass series, soloists including James Ehnes, Jennifer Koh, Philippe Graffin, Daniel Hope and Arabella Steinbacher give their thoughts on some of the greatest works in the string repertoire. Each has annotated the sheet music with their own bowings, fingerings and comments.
The Canada Council of the Arts’ Musical Instrument Bank is 40 years old in 2025. This year’s calendar celebrates some its treasures, including four instruments by Antonio Stradivari and priceless works by Montagnana, Gagliano, Pressenda and David Tecchler.
Michelin-starred Wood Restaurant is a must-visit for any foodies in Cervinia. The Swedish chef celebrates the best of Swedish and Italian cuisine in spectacular tasting menus that are a feast for the senses. La Chandelle also comes highly recommended with a mix of Alpine classics and fine dining.
Courmayeur
Pierre Alexis 1877, in the historic centre of Courmayeur, has an impressive dining room with a vaulted ceiling and offers spectacular cuisine with many ingredients foraged from the local area. L’Enoteca L’Armadillo Is principally a wine bar but offers fusion cuisine prepared by a Japanese chef.
La Thuile
The Bistrò Alpino at the Montana Lodge & Spa is a lovely modern restaurant serving top quality in cuisine using the freshest, local ingredients in a refined setting.
Aagha Ali is an actor, model and singer. He has been working in the industry for two decades now. The actor comes from a showbiz family. His late father was an actor who passed away when he was very young. His brother Ali Sikandar is also an actor. He is also related to Waseem Abbas who is his uncle and Ali Abbas is his cousin.
Aagha Ali has been open about his love life. He was married to fellow actress Hina Altaf. They had an intimate wedding and they shared a lot from their life with the world. The duo went on to split later on. They declared their divorce not too long ago and Aagha Ali’s statement regarding being happily divorced was viral recently.
Aagha Ali was a guest on FHM podcast and he explained his statement about being happily divorced. He said that Ahmed Ali Butt used the word happily divorced and things just went from there. He is not promoting being happy about divorce but people separate in a marriage as they were unhappy and it is okay to find happiness after a relationship ends. This is what he meant by being happily divorced.
Duchess of York enters baby care market with nappy line
Sarah, Duchess of York, is taking an unexpected leap into the baby care industry as she continues to carve out her path to financial independence.
Th royal known as Fergie has never shied away from reinvention. Over the years, she has dabbled in a wide range of ventures, from selling fountain pens and food blenders to serving as an ambassador for Weight Watchers.
She has also published children’s books and romance novels with Mills & Boon, and even co-hosted a podcast where “no topic was off the table.”
Now, in her latest entrepreneurial twist, Fergie is turning her attention to nappies an unexpected move that once again proves her knack for surprising the public with bold new directions.
“I’ve created an eco-friendly nappy,” she told the Mail. “It’s very exciting, being a grandmother, because the more grandchildren I have, the more urgency there is for compostable diapers.”
Fergie, who is grandmother to four Beatrice’s daughters Sienna, three, and baby Athena, six months, along with Eugenie’s sons August, four, and Ernest, two says age and life experience have only strengthened her determination as she embarks on this new chapter.
The brand, called The Greater Good, is a collaboration with Dr. Jason Graham-Nye and his wife, Kim, entrepreneurs once named among Fortune’s Ten Most Powerful Women in Business.
Together, they have developed what they describe as the world’s first fully compostable diaper, manufactured in Samoa.
“There are 380,000 nappies changed a minute,” Fergie said. “So it’s a really good solution.”
Meghan Markle may decide to publically bash Royal family again
Meghan Markle may launch new attacks on the Royal family amid Prince Harry’s ongoing peace talks with King Charles.
Royal expert Jack Royston told The Sun that the Duchess of Sussex has said she hadn’t signed anything and could say what she wanted against the Royals.
The expert noted that these hints from Meghan feel like ongoing threats that more could be revealed at any time.
He told the publication, “The problem is with the way Harry and Meghan piled in quite relentlessly on the royals.
“Particularly, I do think the Oprah interview, they did botch it… it could have been done differently and better in a way that would be less toxic and destructive,” he added.
The expert continued, “The racism allegation, they have clearly tried to change it retrospectively or row it back. So, obviously, Meghan botched how she described that story.
“But there’s always been this thing that Meghan’s kind of intimated that she’s got receipt, that was in the days after Oprah, one of her friends went on ITV and said, ‘we’ve got the receipts to prove everything.’
“There was also a point where she was giving an interview and she said ‘I’ve never signed anything, so I can say whatever I want.’”
Royston further said, “So, she’s always had this tendency to give these kind of slightly veiled threats that she’s sitting on this bombshell.
“There was one point I think they suggested they’d found their diaries that they kept during these periods.
“They’ve always been floating these ideas that they’re sitting on a kind of a massive nuclear warhead that they can drop at any point.”
