THE MICHIGAN DAILY Saturday, January 30, 1971 theatre music nn Arbor drama: Alive and growing By MARCIA ABRAMSON Theatre is growing, and growing free, in Ann Arbor. If last ht's opening of the five-week Ann Arbor Drama Festival is an ample of things to come, there will be a lot of good move- nt coming at Canterbury House. Setting theatre in the sparseness of Canterbury, with no trap- gs, no admission (a donation if you can) seems to eliminate barrier between actor and audience. This theatre can be part you, and if it fails, you find yourself forgiving and welcoming the -enpt. Last night's two plays, The Dinner, by Richard Lees, and a sidential College production, Muzeeka, by John Guare, were, pectively, almost a failure and very close to a success. At its t, Muzeeka reached a high level of tragicomedy; at its worst, e Dinner seemed a stale repetition of Pinteresque devices. Both plays depend heavily on established traditions of the itemporary theatre, but Muzeeka gets by all that with a free inging sense of humor, including inventive wordplays and thea- cal devices. When the protagonist, Jack Argue, makes a phone .1 the actress holding the telephone prop also WAS the tele- one, complete with clicks and buzzes. When blood was called for, e same deadpan actress simply poured from the ketchup bottle. For this sense of humor alone Muzeeka would be worth seeing. Is a basically funny play, although it also attempts a wide- rging social satire which sometimes seems overstated; how many ies can you hear Lyndon Johnson's "mah fellow Americans..."? The progress of Jack Argue, who looks like the epitome of aightness in his coat and tie and his house in Connecticut, is irked by banners which cross Brecht and Fielding: "In which gue learns something about himself:" "In which Argue sings a ny (which he does, down to the serial number)." Underneath Argue is a heart which longs for the natural man. idolizes the mystery of the Etruscans and feels close to animals xcept dolphins who are as confused as men). Argue's plot is to Quintet: Wind from the woods 1 -Daily-Tam Stanton Sharing alspecial thing By DONALD SOSIN Twentieth - century compos- ers have produced a prolifera- tion of works for wind ensemble, and four of them were pre- sented in a generally innocuous but pleasing concert last night by the University Woodwind Quintet. The Pastoral (1945) by Vin- cent Persichetti opened the pro- gram. Born in 1915, the com- posernhas a solid reputation as a pianist and theorist, in addi- tion to that established for his prolific creative output. The brief example of his work that we heard was typical in its har- monies; he writes in a neo- classic style which is relatively free of cliches, but on the other hand does not often offer some- thing vastly original. He fre- quently employs quartal harmo- nies. which were pretty well used up by the time Hindemith got through with them; so I was not really excited by this nev- ertheless gentle and lyrical work. Similarly effective, while lack- ing uniqueness, was L e o n Stein's Sextet for Alto Saxo- phone and Wind Quintet, in which the group was assisted by Laurence Teal. Stein, a Chicago composer of the same genera- tion as Persichetti really gets into parallel fourths and in this respect leans on Hindemith. His work lacks variety in sound and texture, though, so while it is not really bad music, it does not meet a very high stan- dard. I am tempted to say the obvious a b o u t the Partita (1948) by Irving Fine, but I will resist and call the work delightful in its varied moods. An introduction leads to a theme, of which the first frag- ment and its inversion are then presented in a variation. This is The Michigan Daily, edited and man- aged by students at the University of Michigan. News phone: 764-0552. Second Class postage paid at Ann Arbor, Mich- i-a n, 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor. Michigan 48104. Published daily Tues- day through Sunday morning Univer- sity year. Subscription rates: $10 by carrier. $10 by mail. Summer Session published Tuesday through Saturday morning. Subscrip- tion rates: $5 by carrier, $5 by mail. followed by a short interlude which anticipates the exuberant Gigue. I found this movement fascinating in terms of counter- point as well as form, which was basically sonata, ending abrupt- ly in a new tonality. A plaintive coda concludes the work, wvhichi I felt to be the most interesting on the program. The evening concluded with Leslie Bassett's Woodwind Quin- tet, written in 1958 and dedi- cated to the members of the University ensemble at that time. In four alternating slow- fast movements, a powerful feel- ing of motion is created through the use of trills and ostinato rhythms, a feeling which con- tributes more to the success of the work than the melodic ma- terial: it is hard to do very much with trills. As with the Persi- chetti and Stein I was content if not overwhelmed. Variety from the contempo- rary fare was provided on the DOUBLE FEATURE-ENDS TODAY 4 first half by the Sinfonia No. 1, by Johann Cristoph Bach and arranged by h o r n i s t Mason Jones. As far as performance gos I was most happy with this work. because of the balance and attention given to dynamics. something noticeably lacking in the Bassett, for example. There were technical difficulties in spots throughout the program, but one should remember, as with she Stanley Quartet, that these are teachers taking time out from their heavy schedules, and the large audience testified to the appreciation of their time :jnd effort. * * * As a coda, I feel f would be negligent in my duties as a sur- veyor of the music scene if I did not take note of the 95th birth- day of Havergal Brian, British composer of thirty-four sym- phonies among other things. Happy Birthday and good luck on number 35. "ONE OF THE YEAR'S 10 BEST!" -Vincent Canby, N.Y. Times -Russell Baker, 'The Observer'--N.Y. Times --Rex Reed in N.Y. Times "ONE OF THE YEAR'S 10 BEST!" -Judith Crist, New York Magazine -Bob Salmogci, Group W Radio ROBERT REDFORD in -Daily-Tom Gottlieb take over the world through Muzeeka, the piped-in music which he will control to release the hidden Etruscan in every one. In perhaps the best scene of the play, Argue visits a prostitute (enchantingly grossly done by Leora Manischewitz) who can see through him "You're a phony," she tells him. "NO I'm not, I read Catcher in the Rye," he answers, but he is Left At A Loss-he knows it is true. The lovely lumpen provides pleasure through a flashy machine with a long tube; Argue wants a real connection, but he can't make t. Argue finds release in killing as he is drafted to Vietnam. He works for CBS .(although NBC offers a better deal, more residuals.) His buddy worries about getting busted down to Channel 56. His buddy is a natural man from the country, a dreamer of simple pleasures, whether at home or on rest-and-recreation in Bang- cock or Thigh-land. When Argue discovers this natural man really makes cess- pools and advertises them in giant neon signs on mountaintops, it it all over. Argue self-destructs. The Dinner was a much less ambitious attempt, presumably about alienation etc. Two very detached, dried up people have din- ner of sorts (it is burnt of course) and the frumpy nagging wife tells of the visit of the mysterious stranger who asked for a menu- of her daughter. When she took up a pot to chase him away, the stranger smiled and left. Upon hearing this, the deadpan partner gets the idea, smiles and leaves. Lees then chose to repeat the same sequence, except that the quiet husband laughs before he leaves. And then, it seemed as though he was going to do it again-but he stopped at the first line, creating the best moment of the whole play as the audience realized with relief that they did not have to see it again. By DANIEL ZWERDLING Sea Train played one of those rareconcerts last night where an audience, a small audience, knows it has shared a v e r y special hour with a musical gen- ius so extraordinary that few of them will ever hear music quite the same again. That's Sea Train's violinist virtuoso, Richard Greene. Stand- ing tall and looking like Mich- aelangelo's David with long flowing blond curls and a heroic acquiline nose, his violin drips, explodes, shivers, flies, s o m e priceless treasure which Greene caresses and coaxes with total control and rapport. He's part country, part jazz, soaked and raised in classical technique, but Greene has absorbed it all and borne a musical violin hy- brid all his own. Sea Train was a relatively ob- scure Mill Valley band until last summer when they hit the east coast. They often played in- formal afternoon concerts, such as a noon job for office workers in Washington, just to get ex- posure. Now, especially that their new album is out - they cut one before, but would just as soon forget it - they's climb- ing fast to join The Band and Crosby. Stills Nash & Young as the untouchable virtuosos of the folk-country-rock field. It's Richard Greene who makes it. Not that the other four aren't talented musicians, but they're basically backup men, a solid, strong group which provides a canvas for Greene's artistic tri- umphs. But that's how it should be. Greene's violin overshadows everything, leaps above every- thing, Greene standing t h e r e crouching on his spiderlong legs, Order Your Subscription Today 764-0558 twirling slowly on one leg and then stretching from his toes, his face raised and looking off to one side with a blissful smile almost as if he's somewhere in the skies playing for a greater cosmic, audience while the rest of Sea Train is standing there on the stage in Hill Aud. Sea Train began with the lead song on their new album. "Moving". It begins with an insistent rhythmic violin wah wah, and features the two vocal- ists, keyboard man Lloyd Bas- kin and guitarist Peter R o w- lands, in a fresh, close duet. By the second song, "Caroline," everyone knew they were hearing a genius, with Greene's weep- ing, crying solo and drawn out wails beginning on the wah wah pedal. Much of Sea Train's music is solemn, almost semi-religious in the country way - but "All of My Life" is a simple fun refrain. "All my life, I've been looking for someone to be my wife," which, builds up and up in a Beatle-like repetitiondcrescendo, then quiets - and Greene plays alone, reeling at a barn dance then careening on his wah wah, then piercing in octaves, then in a mideastern minor mode, go- ing crazy, Gr-ne, so that his violin bow strings start coming apart and the crowd rises in a standing ovation. The only time I wished Greene wTould keep out of it was a resur- rection of the Blues Project Flute Thing with Andy Kulberg leav- ing his bass to play a moving jazz flute. Greene took over the solo and Kulberg was lost. The one piece where Greene really plays in the background - if he can ever be near the background -- and Sea Train plays as a unit is "Song of Job", a long faithful musical narra- tive of the Bible tale about God's test of Job's faith. It features a magnificent vocal solo by Rowlands who yodels, and sings with a flair for emo- tion and dramatics. Unfortun- ately. Rowlands ruined the po- tential of the piece playing some of the emotion for laughs in- stead of straight. It's as if, just at a crucial moment in a play, some actor burps. * * * set, is one of the finest guitarists in the country. He played Dy- lan's last two albums, and now has become the most sought-af- ter studio man in country-folk music. Bromberg doesn't look the part, this tall, gangly scrag- gly haired boy who looks like he's from Brooklyn Tech and now is playing at country. But he plays extraordinary guitar, mostly blues last night, m o r e sensitive and masterful than any of the great Delta or Chicago blues men I've heard. Bromberg isn't much of a singer, but like Arlo Guthrie whom he often re- sembles, he works well with his coarse, unrefined and untrain- ed voice. It provides a ragged contrast to his guitar, which is infinitely subtle and never miss- es a note: Bromberg always knows when to droop a note; when to lift it, when to slide, when to play it straight or shake it; his fingers move effortless- ly telling the guitar what to say. From Columbia Pictures with Eva Marie Saint and GEORGE SEGAL (star of 'The Owl and the Pussycat') I- "YOU MUST SEE THIS FILM!" -Richard Schicket.Life OPEN JACK NICHOLSON 1 P.M. SHOWS101 9 4th 1:20-3:1vir HITW ' 5-7-9 P.M.WEEK , ILI STATE Theatre 231 S. State DIAL 662-6264 I BONUS FEATURE TONIGHT 9:00 SNEAK. P REVIEW A complete feature-length screening of a new film of which John Schubeck of ABC-TV says: "REMEMBER 'PSYCHO" There are scenes with that kind of impact!" SEE 3 FEATURES TONIGHT "Loving", 5:30-"Racer", 7:15-"Sneak", 9:00-"Loving", 10:45 PIPTH PoruM OWT r.ANA90INFORMATION 741.9700 I I I Sat., Sun.--Jon. 30, 31 THE SHOP ON MAIN STREET di r. Joseph Kador, Czechoslovakia (1965) Oscar for Best Foreign Film of 1965 Gripping story of Czechs, Jews and Nazis during World War 11. "The Shop on Main Street" will make you laugh and, if you ever cry at movies, it willsmake you cry. It isavery funny and very sod, and who could ask more of a movie than that?" -Brendan Gill, New Yorker A4 I S4 "Remember 'PSYCHO'? There are scenes with thc kind of impact!" -JOHN SCHUBECK ABC-TV COMING SOON at c W tThe Definitly in The Hitehck Tradiloa. G C DOM David Bromberg, the guitarist' who played the opening backup I 7 & 9:05 662-8871 75c Architecture Auditorium < 1 I i 0 TONIGHT AT 8:001 MAT. SUN.! FPITH POrM F1*T14 AVRUN MrAL JEw"Y {~DOWNTOWN ANNI ARBON INFORMATION 7461-0700 DOUBLE FEATURE-STARTS TOMORROW "LIZA MINELLI IS SIMPLY INCREDIBLE!" --David Golman, WCBS "SHOULD WIN LIZA MINELLI AN ACADEMY AWARD!" -Life Magazine SPECIAL STUDENT DISCOUNT M e 0 I "MARVELOUS !"--Newsweek "WONDERFUL"-HolidoY HELD OVER k BY POPULAR DEMAND! IS THE MOST MOVING, THE MOST INTELLIGENT, THE MOST HUMANE - OHTO HELL WITH IT! - IT'S THE BEST AMERICAN FILM I'VE SEENTHISYEAR!" -VINCENT CANBY, N.Y. TIMES SKI Alpine Valley Every Wednesday nice SIGN-UP Tues. 7:15 Union Assembly Room or call 663-2277 I Paramount Pictures Presents Technicolor" A Poromount Picture PWMPN ploorimpl NOW ! : . DIAL 8-6416 S "A New York Version of ALO THE GRADUATE"'!"" --JUDITH CRIST "M-YAnc.M Co.&R, MMi A INS I KMU IISUL IENUr N ~ . H ., I 0 1.E~ W ~ .~L~.u m 15 I %.Jl 11 * i .. i . E- ., 1=-