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GRAMMY FOR BRAMMY? Vancouver Symphony Orchestra's music director Bramwell Tovey opened the orchestra-benefiting Lovers' Ball Thursday by conducting Maurice Ravel's Bolero. Fortunately for diners, Hotel Vancouver executive chef Robert LeCrom's calamaras encebollados and costilla de cordero con fruto secos (lamb with dried fruit) didn't repeat like the composer's theme.

But there was a welcome repetition for Tovey before he and wife Lana Penner Tovey left for Sunday's Grammy Awards ceremony in L.A. The orchestra and violinist James Ehnes are nominated for their CBC recording of concertos by Samuel Barber, Erich Korngold and William Walton. As he packed, Tovey learned the same CD has netted a Juno nomination.

A Grammy win would boost the VSO's clout in choosing recording repertoire. Tovey wants to wax a CD of Beethoven works "to go into every school in Canada."

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After dinner Thursday, Evan Mitchell conducted the orchestra for waltzing, and the Lover's Ball -- chaired by Maria Menten and Heidi von Pfetten and oft-repeated honorary chair Nezhat Khosrowshahi -- rolled on in graceful three-four and six-eight time.

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WIN-LOSE: Marathon-running U.S. Consul-General Lewis Lukens sponsored the Lovers' Ball wine selections, aided by Select Wine Merchants and Townline Homes. Asked about the Chinese consulate's mass entry in the Vancouver Sun Run on April 20, Lukens replied diplomatically: "I'm looking forward to the friendly competition."

Wife Lucy Lukens, who'll also participate in the 10-kilometre event, was more forthright: "He wants to kick butt, and I want a smaller butt."

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DING DONG BELLE: City fashion designer Jason Matlo provided just the incentive for Lovers' Ball attendees who shared Lucy Lukens's personal aspiration. It was a blue jersey gown that fitted Angela Case's hips like a second skin while staying well clear of the donated Tiffany diamond necklace and earrings she modelled for raffling.

An accomplished Beethoven pianist on her own century-old Heintzman, Case has been featured in Kokanee beer commercials since 2003. In the first, her appearance as a potential glacier saviour inspired -- like Matlo's dresses -- the much-repeated response: "Ding, dong!"

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THEY DID: Vancouver Symphony Society chair Art Wilms and Mary Ann Clark sure put the "lover" in Lovers' Ball. Their first official date was at the 2003 event -- a year after Wilms had given the orchestra $500,000. This year, following a May 8 ceremony, they greeted guests as a married couple.

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VIVE LE FILM: Movies routinely portray Vancouver as an American city. But Pemberton as Turkmenistan?

Murielle Freoa plans to use that past-Whistler locale for a feature film about Turkmenistan's legendary female warriors, the Amazons. Meanwhile, the former Paris, Berlin and Montreal moviemaker is producing short films, documentaries and music videos like Sin City Circus Ladies' Pity That You Are Dead and Faster Pussy Cat.

Her works are among the 72 to be screened in the 14th Rendez-vous du Cinema Quebecois et Francophone -- www.rendez-vousvancouver.com -- which will run at the Vancouver International Film Centre until Feb 16.