AT NAT TRAL RESOURCES BALL:
Dan ce
By ERIC ZORN
"This is a real 'good-ole time,"'
sparkled a young "Lumberjill" at
Friday night's Paul Bunyan Ball. "The
dancing and singing and county-fair
contests are great!" Another im-
pressed reveller, dressed in the
suggested costume of dungarees and a
flannel shirt, expressed his satisfaction
"that the lights are all up and there's no
one drunk and being weird and
throwing up."
The Paul Bunyan fest, an old Univer-
sity tradition which hasn't been seen
since 1968, was revived this year by an
energetic Natural Resources Club. The
Union Ballroom wasthe scene for dan-
cing, musical performances, and
various contest such as tobacco spit-
ting, crosscut sawing, Paul Bunyan
look-alike, and biggest foot. Prizes for
these contests were supplied by a host
of area businesses.
The evening started off somewhat
rs getBt
slowly as Art Bently called square dan-
ces and about thirty couples pounded
the floorboards. Dancing to records is
almost always uninspiring when com-
pared to the real thing, and it was a
welcome change when Ann Arbor's
Peter Ruth got out his harmonicas for a
half an hour of bluesy folk and jazz.
Ruth is a remarkable virtuoso, but
he's always seemed to lack that stage
charm and ability to capture an
audience that many folk performers
have. He will be appearing very soon
for a weekend at the Ark, and it will be
interesting to see how his act holds
together over an entire evening.
r!a men
i
Al
inyans
The Sharon Hollow String Band, a
local collection of old-timey musicians,
helped to set the place on fire as a good
percentage of the over seven hundred
people who showed up at the ball jam-
med their way onto the dance floor for
some well-taught and well-called
square dancing. It was a shame that,
with all the hoofing and stomping, we
didn't get to hear more of Bill Miller's
precise fiddling and the tasteful in-
strumentation of the rest of the band.
For those who could draw themselves
away from the center of action, the
Sharon Hollow Band was jamming
down in the Pendleton Room for a good
portion of the evening. The Natural
Resources Club had also set up an im-
pressive set of exhibits which detailed
the scope of their activities, and those
accoutred in flannel shirts and jeans
who tired 'of battling the crush in the
ballroomm found the extra room a
welcome and educational retreat.
The Ball, which spokesman Chris
Polson called "surprisingly suc-
cessful," finished up with the Natural
Resources Jug Band and the country
rock electric sounds of the Steve
Newhouse group. The NR Jugband was
informal and sloppy, but there were ob-
viously several very talented in-
dividuals scattered around the crowded
stage, especially the two female
vocalists.
And since the evening was a mixed-
bag-of-picklesrentertainment-wise
anyway, the rock dancing to the
Newhouse band didn't have a twisting
efect on the overall mood. Sponsors
hope the ball will run next year as well.
Sorrels
soporiflC
By MIKE TAYLOR
The first time I saw Rosalie
Sorrels was an evening I'll never
forget. From the moment she walked
up totherArk stage to begin a mar-
velous story-song to the moment her set
ended, my eyes never strayed. I was
immediately taken by her severe,
knowing face, and her sharp, almost
brittle voice. She was a fierce spirit,
and her passion spilled into every song.
The next day, I bought her Philo LP
Always A Lady, and when Moments of
Happiness : came out last year, I was
the first to buy it.
I guess you could call me a Rosalie
Sorrels fan; needless to say, I've been
waiting for her to come back to Ann Ar-
bor. Friday evening, that night arrived.
SADLY, THE magic seemed to be
gone. Sorrels performed two lethargic
sets of pleasant 'but unexceptional
songs-hardly the kindl of stuff
memories are made of. Rosalie looked
tired and announced before her first
song that she had just broken her
See SORRELS, Page 7
The Michigan Daily-Sunday, February 18, 1979-Page 5
UNO
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Owl I
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Roger visits the Dennison Building
BEFORE DISCUSSING THE results of the past week's research in
the walls and stalls of the Dennison Building, I'd like to thank those of
you who have written in helpful advice and suggestions. Although I would en-
joy using this column to respond to each letter with appropriate spelling
corrections and counseling referrals, I must'resist the temptation to exist in
the higher spiritual plane of Dear Abby or Ann Landers, and thus it's back to
the bathrooms.
The insinuation is none of the aforementioned letters (see last Sunday's
Edit page) that I had not actually been' in the Dennison Building served as
the impetus for my tour there this past week. And a sad tour it proved to
bie. The old place has never fully recovered from its last coat of whitewash.
Some prime locations remain depressingly bare, particularly in the
basement stairwells.
But let's start at the top. The single highest piece of writing on "U" proper-
ty is the bon mot "scumbag" on the service tower stairs, 11th floor. After
that, one must descend to the sixth floor for anything beyond an occasional
"Where's all the graffiti?" The sixth floor men's room contains two
remarkable artifacts: "Nixon is a Coxsucker" and the even more ancient
".Johnson is screwing Vietnam, make him pull out." How many thousands of
people must have read that message over the years? This is truly in-
spirational for those who wish to reach a large audience.
THE SIXTH FLOOR west stairs display the first sample of the oft-
repeated "Dream Carefully", and the bathroom has a stall filled with "I
Love Finals", "Finals are Great", and a rather inexplicable "Hi Mom!".
The fourth floor john offers sexual bathroom philosophy, while the stairs
show the first real signs of life. A graffiti war between some children from
Markley's Butler house intermingled with rock 'n' roll debates, for exam-
ple: "Clapton is God", "No, Jesus Is.", "Who?". On the east stairs, the first
traces of Tolkien trivia are visible.
The third, second, and first floors are where the gooJ stuff is, and I suggest
you see them yourself. Here are some landmarks you'll not want to miss.
Each floor's lavatory contains vulgar remarks almost too salty for the
Daily, such as "Your mother sucks off illegal aliens (3rd one on the left) and
the second floor features a lively "engineers vs. LSA" debate, while the first
floor can boast a cliche-ridden political fracas and little more.
The stairwells are generally not as bare as the bathrooms, but they have
one tremendously annoying item: trivia quizzes.,Perhaps it is a mark of the
,physicist's mind that he cannot listen to Steely Dan for musical values or read
Lord of the Rings for theme or style; instead, the P. & A. authors are driven
to memorizing trivia details and showing off their pointless knowledge. I
greatly enjoy both Tblkien and Steely Dan, and am saddened whenever Lsee
their work trivialized by calculator-bearing neanderthals. The caustic
question added by one writer, "OK asshole, how many words in LOTR?",
comforts me only slightly, because somewhere in this University someone is
usually counting.
EQUALLY USELESS are the fervent dedications of loyalty to one dead.
rock star after another. Housing authorities will be interested to note that
Jim Morrison not only lives, but apparently holds the leases to both 4228
Markley and 556 Williams, West Quad.
All is not dull, fortunately. Among the bright spots are obscurities like
"Suck Off My Atwood's Machine" and the "Clone Order Sheet," or the nicely
lettered "Your mother is no stranger to the embraces of several furry
mammals." Old favorites like "Reality is for those who can't face drugs"
and "Bomb Toledo" still thrive, along with tasteless topical remarks such as
"Free the Guyana 900" and "Sid Vicious Lives" (Note: He doesn't). For the
literate, there's a tombstone for Holden Caulfield with the epitaph "Fuck
You".
A few Star Trek comments still hang on, including the famous " 'Bones?'
'He's dead, Jim'," and downvn the first landing of the east stairwellis the
best example of all, the Star Wars debate. This discussion of scientific ac-
curacy in the popular movie is notable for its emphasis on good spelling and
logical rigor. I gave it four stars and recommend it highly. Beneath it is
scrawled "This is nothing like Music School graffiti! You physicists are all
so intellectual."
This may be, but I think I'll look at the Grad.
1
Dinner theatre serves
up light, fluffy opera
Department of Romance Languages
Summer Study Program
SALAMANCA, SPAIN
and
1A ROCHELLE, FRANCE
SECOND INFORMATION MEETING
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 22
4:00 PM
Lecture Room II, MLB
AGENDA: Fees
Deadlines
Applications
TICKETS NOW ON SALE!
The Actors Ensemble Presents
THE ARDICA FlOW
Ruth Wolff's powerful play about
Queens, Pontiffs, Power, and Love
March 15-18, 8 pm
L tydia Mendelsso/,n Theatre
Tickets $3.50 & $4.00
at UAC Ticket Central Michigan Union
Call 763-1107 or 763-1543
Sponsored by UAC & MSA
UAC-MUsket Presents
Leonard Bernstein's 1 st Musical Comedy
ON
-THE
TOWN..
Power Center-April 5-7
Tickets On Sale
Tuesday, Feb. 20
Ticket Central Michigan Union
"New York, New York! It's a Helluva town!!"
For Info. call 763-1107
Use Daily Classifeds
By DIANE HAITHMAN
If you 'find yourself particularly
hungry for fine food and musical frolic
all in the same evening, visit the
University Club for a highly amusing if
highly-priced combination of both.
Some of the Music School's best voices
combine with cuisine this weekend and
the next for two nights of operatic
playfulness in "Opera Opera" and
"Telephone." Dinner theatre lends a
strange hint of class to the Ann Arbor
bill of fare-but don't let the word
"opera" scare you away.
Don a tie with your jeans and enjoy.
r'le Tlephone, Opera Opera
By Gian Carlo Menotti; and William Saroyan
n ,err v ( o Dinner eater
Feb. 16, 17, 2:, 21
Opera Singer.
Gangster.........
Sister.............
Lucy............
Ben ............
.Julia Broxholm
........Michael Doll
.......Carol Madalin
Julia Broxholm
.Michael Doll
telephone, he wails, is a "two-headed
monster . . . with miles of umbilical
cord." Even his feeble attempt to mur-
der the telephone by clipping the wires
is thwarted. Broxholm's soprano is, as
usual, breathtaking. However, this
musically fascinating piece waxes a
mite tedious simply because an in-
fatuation withatelephone can't sustain
an audience even fors the few frivolous
minutes it requires.
Those who go only to the performance
and skip dinner should be warned that
each mini-opera is only about half an
hour long, and there is a twenty-minute
intermission during which one feels
obliged to drink. So, if you go, try to
make a full evening of it-it's one you'll
delight in frittering away.
Paintings, Drawings
& Sculpture
Lisa Levit &
Richard Tuschman
Feb:6 - March 2
Reception. Feb.9, 7-9 p.m.
Tuea-Fri. 10-6
Sat, Sun. 12- 5
764-3234
FIRST FLOOR MICHIGAN UNION
Russell B. Collins,
firod'd(ic or , i .ad dci nrii
The first offering is William
Saroy an's "Opera Opera," in which a
troupe of guileless performers unite for
no reason whatsoever to be directed by
a hard-sell candy vendor to enact a
spontaneous murder/tragedy. It's quite
funny, but the astonishingly lovely.
voices of Julia Broxholm and Carol
Madalin seem almost wasted on this lit-
tle bit of fluff. The scene is admittedly
silly, and made even more enjoyably so
by the performance of Michael Doll as a
confused but obliging gangster.
"The Telephone," by Gian Carlo
Menotti, involves a man in love with a
woman who is in love with her
telephone. His repeated attempts to
propose marriage to her are interrup-
ted by telephone jangles so well-timed
that they even begin to annoy the
audience. The frustrated Michael Doll
is once again a pleasure to watch. The
D IVE1 ITY c5MUSICAL G8O
d"Mrnv
The first baby carriage' patent in the
United States was issued in 1829. I
E A Play by
THEf Nikolai Gogoi
INSPECTOR
GENEPAL-
Featuring
Philip LeStrange
as the Mayor
Wed-Sat Feb. 14-17, 8PM
Sun., Feb.18. 2PM
Tickets at the PTP Box Office
ed. pse
_/fD ~JAZZ ARTISTS ON TOUR!
GRO"GLX
Good:I
er
University Symph
Gustav Mc
Fifth Annual Be
o GRIOT GALAXY
SAM SANDERS & VISIONS
THE PARADISE THEATRE ORCHESTRA
Featuring
ALLEN BARNES
MARCUS BELGRAVE
RON ENGLISH
KENNY GARRETT
ED GOOCH
LMONTE HAMILTON
DOC HOLLADAY
RON JACKSON
LEONARD KING
$350 DON MAYBERRY
KEITH VREELAND
4.50 LYMAN WOODARD
5.50
Tickets on Sale Now
Mon.-Fri., 11:30-5:30Michi n
Union Box Office. Also
Schoolkids' and both Disco u
man
and
cony Orchestra
Icr, Conductor
at the
nefit Concert
N!
gan
at
)unt
The 'King of Swing' plays with the University Symphony ,for an evening of classical
music and Broadway hits to benefit the School of Music Scholarship Fund and the
University Musical Society. Goodman joins the orchestra for Concertino for Clari-
net and Orchestra by Weber and a medley of Broadway hits. Tickets are' $5, $7, $8,
$9; and $25 (which includes a 'Meet the Artists' reception and tax-deductible gift.)
By mail or at Burton Tower, Ann Arbor 48109, weekdays 9-4:30, Sat. 9-12.
f