Andre Le Roux is four days into his visit to Chattanooga from South Africa, where he is manager of the Southern Music Rights Organization Endowment for the National Arts. SAMRO oversees music publishing in that country much the same way ASCAP does here, Leroux said.

He is here as part of a Kennedy Center mentor program designed to train international arts organization managers. He spent last week at the center and will spend a week here hosted by Allied Arts and will return to New York for another week of discussion.

Le Roux said he is spending of his time here researching two aspects of the Allied Arts model. The first is the Partners in Education Program with Hamilton County Schools and the other how AA handles fundraising and distribution for a variety of arts organizations.

“Fundraising is always an issue with arts organizations,” he said.

He is especially interested in learning more about encouraging estate giving from arts patron.

Le Roux said being able to spend a week at the Kennedy and then coming here to witness an organization at the “grass roots” level has been valuable to his work.

“It is so nice to be getting that perspective immediately after the Kennedy Center experience.”

* Bessie Smith, who has been dead since 1937, will be inducted into the Nesuhi Ertegun Jazz Hall of Fame at Jazz at Lincoln Center in November, according to a news release.

The folks at Jazz at Lincoln Center wrote of the Chattanooga native, best known as the Empress of the Blues, “No one has equaled her combination of vocal power, emotional projection and incomparable time.”

Smith will be inducted along with Mary Lou Williams, Gil Evans and Ornette Coleman.

Smith began her singing career on local street corners at age 9 and sometime in her teens joined the Rabbit Foot Minstrels traveling show led by Gertrude “Ma” Rainey. At the height of her career, Smith sold 100,000 records a week. She performed with all of the greats of the day including Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong and Fletcher “Smack” Henderson.

She died in Clarksdale, Miss., from injuries received in an automobile accident. She is buried in Philadelphia.

Locally, a performance hall on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and a strut during Riverbend are named in her honor.

* Club Fathom on Market Street will host a tribute jam with dance crews and old-school hip-hop to celebrate the life of Nathan “B-Boy Mirakle” Bennett, who died recently after battling two brain infections and spinal menengitis. He was 25 years old.

According to longtime friend and colleague Konstruct, “The tribute itself is a celebration of his life. He was always a peacekeeper and had a lot of love in his heart.”

The event will take place from 7-midnight. It will feature “clean” old-school hip-hop and dance music from the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s provided by DJ Alphatrion, and dance performances by several groups including Risen From the Ashes, the HBO Crew, the Cipher Addictz and the ATL Funk Lordz.

“This is an all-ages event.

Admission is $6, which will cover costs, according to Kunstruct.