Friday, September 6, 1974
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Page Five-B
Fes tival schedule
released
Rainbow Multi-Media Creative Director John Sin-
clair announced recently the following schedule of artists
for the Ann Arbor Blues & Jazz Festival in Exile:
* Friday night: The James Brown Revue, Sun Ra &
His Arkestra, The Persuasians, and the John Nicholas
Blues All-Stars featuring Hubert Sumlin, Mack Thomp-
son, and S. P. Leary.
* Saturday afternoon: "New Jazz of Detroit" (in
association with Strata Records)-Charles Moore's Shat-
terinv Effect, the Lyman Woodard Organization featur-
ing' Ron English and Leonard King, Mixed Bag, and the
Eddie Nuecilli Big Band.
* Saturday night: Luther Allison and his band.
The Cecil Taylor Unit. Jimmy "Fast Fingers" Dawkins
and his band (winner of the Grand Prix du Disques,
Paris, for 1972), Hound Doi Taylor & the Houserockers,
and introducing Detroit vocalist Ursula Walker with
Kenn Cox and the Guerrilla Jam Band.
* Sunday afternoon: "Detroit Blues" with John Lee
Hooker and his bind, Junior Walker and the All Stars,
Johnnie Mae Matthews and her band, Black Nasty,
Boogie Woogie Red with the John Nicholas Blues All-
Stars, One String Sam, and Little Junior Cannady and
his band.
* Sunday night: B. B. King, The Gil Evans Orches-
tra, Albert Collins and his band, Sunnyland Slim Blues
Band, and Robert Junior Lockwood.
The Festival in Exile will be held at Griffin Hollow
Amphitheatre at St. Clair College, Windsor, this Friday,
Saturday and Sunday. It is produced by Rainbow Multi-
Media of Ann Arbor in association with CKLW Radio
and St. Clair College. Griffin Hollow has a capacity of
12,000 and is located six miles from the Detroit-Windsor
border.
Showtimes are Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights:
7:00 to 12:00 p.m., Saturday and Sunday afternoon: 12:00
noon to 5:30 p.m. Tickets for all five shows over the
three-day Festival weekend are $22, which includes $2
Canadian tax.
Daily Photo by STEVE KAGAN
CROWDS OF 20,000 jammed Otis Spann Field by Huron High last year to watch the world's
best talent in blues and jazz.
A final epot: ' summer
movies were, generally, good
Michigan Daily
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Doily Photo by KEN FINK
LUTHER ALLISON performs at last summer's Ann Arbor Blues and Jazz Festival.
By DAVID BLOMQUIST
Believe it or not, the 1974
film year won't actually begin'
until next week - according,
at least, to present Hollywood
opinion.
In a sense, that seems rather
surprising - considering, after!
all, that what was expected to
be a slow summer at the mov-
ies turned out instead to be a,
feast with some really good
"sleepers."
Nevertheless, the thinking of.
California film circles at t h e
moment appears to be that this
summer's hits will very soon be
dwarfed by the five or six ex-
pected box office superspectac-a
11lars due in the last four months
of the year, and may be even
completely forgotten by the,
time Oscar nominations open up
next February.
Yet this reviewer, for one,
thinks that would be a most
regrettable omission. The re-
leases of the past fifteen or so,
weeks, as far as I'm concerned,
included some very fine a n d
quite noteworthy pictures that
Ellington ban g sonsans Duke
By MARY CAMPBELL
AP Writer
The Ellington Band is togeth-
er, touring, cutting a record
and sounding good. Mercer El-
lington, 55, is leading. A talk
with this only child of the late
Duke Ellington is very reas-
suring pr a person concerned
iwith te well-being of the band.
Ellington obviously knows mil-
.ic, knows what he is doing,
.nows how to make decisions,
as sensitive to people's feelings,
has a sense 'of theater and is
unpretentious and likeable.
The funeral of ..Duke Elling-
ton, who had led a band since
the mid-1920s, played piano and
composed nobody knows how
mrnany pieces of music, was
May 27. The very next day the
band left to keep an engage-
ment in Bermuda,:ith' Billy
Taylor playing piano.
Ellington s a y s, "I wasn't
nemotionally in shape to make
announcements about each
song and show a glad hand.
The best I could do was organ-
ize things and see they were
carried on in a certain fashion.
"There were some differ-
ences of opinion about who
should be up front. Someone
thought it shouid be a person-
ality like Ddke Ellington. Some
people thought it should be a
piano player. I kept my ears
open and listened to everything
everybody had to say. The time musicians."
carne when I had to put the in- About five of the new mem-
formation together and make bers are 23. Ellington says,
sense out of it. To listen any "The only trouble with having
further would be indecisive and a young band is that they go in
we wouldn't have any progress for all sorts of fantastic activi-
made," he adds. ties - in Bermuda they were
"I found the best piano play- water skiing and going in for'
er I could find who would come bicycle boats, motor bikes, golf,
to work with us - Lloyd May- swimming and tenis. Girls I
ers - and the best bassist - could have understood. The re-
Larry Ridley. That is what suilt was that by th time we
pulled the band together. I were ready to go on, they were
knew Lloyd from organ records ready to takea neap. Thev left
he had made, when I was a Bermuda the healthiest bunch
disc jockey on WLIB. Lately he of nonplaying musicians I ever'
has been accompanying Sam- had my hands on."
my Davis and other singers. Devotees of the band's veter-
Larry had been doing a lot of ans will be reassured to know
studio work. They were both that trumpeter Cootie Williams,
able to make more money than in the band 1929-40 and since
they make with me. I got them 1962, and baritone saxonhonist
on the sole principle that with Harry Carney, who joined in
me they will be more musically 1927, are still blowing. Trom-
employed." The band's bassist, I bonist Lawrence Brown is go-
Joe Benjamin, was killed in a ing to rejoin. Ellington says, "I
car accident in January. feel that the day Lawrence
"I was sitting in the band at Brown enters the band should
first and the music wasn't com- be a smart affair: I'd like to
ing out with any degree of ex- time it so it is during some
pression.People were making gala occasion."
suggestions about what would There are now 15 musicians
i
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people were interested in Rutgers professor is trans-'
whether the band would go on. cribing the trio part to "Kinda
We were concerned with losing Dukeish" and will do more; El-
people's awareness of the lington wants to get in touch
band's existence in waiting too with Lena Horne, whose late
long. And then the number of husband made a hobby of
well-wishers who wanted the transcribing Duke Ellington pi-
band to stay intact so the mu- ano solos. Duke Ellington also
sic of Duke Ellington would live wrote three notebooks of music
took on another meaning. It this spring in the hospital.
wasn't just a matter of the Ellington has hired his wife's
show must go on." brother as road manager,
Columbia Records has just which he used to be. "That
come out with a two-LP set, ' means I can put the pencil
"The World of Duke Ellington," back in my hand." His best-
reissues from 1946-47, which known composition is "Things
ad been scheduled to come out Ain't What They Used To Be,"
three years ago. Fantasy will but the band now is playing his
soon bring out an album of "Blue Serge" and "The Living
Dike Ellington piano solos and Room."
RCA soon will release the Ellington wants the band to
' T h i r d Sacred Concert," plays some of the less-often-
recorded live in Westminster heard compositions by his
Abbey last fall. father. He'll play an entirely
Ellington says, "We're pro- different program each nightI
ducing our own record now, in when the band plays two nights
the same method Pop used to in the same town. He wants to
do. From time to time he would bring back some use of the
feel the band had a particular plunger mute and a full tone
edge on it and he would go into from the tenor sax.
a studio to catch it and take He brought Maurice Simon
advantage of the sound he was from California: Simon was the
getting. featured tenor sax player when
"As tight as the old band Ellington managed Cootie Wil-
used to be, you could tell when hams's band. Ellington tenor
they'd been off three or four player Paul Gonsalves died in}
days. That's basically why Pop May. .
never liked to take days off. "I brought James Boldden in
Two or three days could wreak ! mainly to relieve Money
havoc with the unity of the Johnson on trumpet. He had
band. All of them are strong in been doing lead and solos; now
their own stylistic ways but I don't have to worry about
very different from each other. playing two brassy numbers
With two or three days apart after another and wearing him
and them practicing by them- out. Suddenly the brass section
selves in their homes they'd is the strongest; I need things
start pulling away from the like 'Ko Ko,' 'Congo Brava' and
general concept of what makes 'Flaming'Sword to show it off.
the effect jell." The band is fairly strongly
Ellington has several projects booked, Ellington says. "At one
going. His son, Edward Kenne- date, in Buffalo, we had given
dy Ellington II, who studies the promoter a concession on
drew a frightening study of a late August, proved to be one
nervous little man in the midst of the best flicks out of the
of a harrowing business - the Disney complex in years. Per-
eavesdropping trade. Coppola haps there still is hope for the
somewhat overstated his point G movie.)
in the end, but Conversation The award for the worst
was nevertheless a striking and scripting of the summer, how-
extremely well-executed pic- ever, goes (and not coincident-
ture. ally) to the summer's biggest
Peter Bogdanovich's Daisy bombs - the two musicals.
Miller might have been another Paul Zindel, late of Man-In-
fine entry for the '74 summer The-Moon Marigolds, tried to
portrait gallery, but a rather convert the previously muted
cold performance from title star but undeniably charming Mame
Cybill Shepherd cast a some- into a socially modernized pic-
what gloomy pall over the en- ture for Lucille Ball. Lucy was
tire film. Still, Daisy was an great, but Zindel's attempt to
exciting movie from a technical paint Auntie Mame as an early
standpoint; a 270-degree p a n white desegregationist just d I d
around a Roman party, f o r not come off, considering that
example, was a novel and quite the movie's main chorus num-
memorable touch. - ber is set on a Southern plan-
On the whole, in fact, direc- tation without a single b i a c k
tion this summer - even in the dancer in sight.
worst losers - was for the most Even clumsier, though, was
part tolerable. Instead, t h e Richard M. and Robert B.
Achilles' heel seemed to be Sherman's handling of the mo-
in the screenwriting. Some of ment when Huckleberry F i n n
the past few months' releases decides to help slave Jim gain
featured some embarrassingly his freedom in Reader's Digest's
noor scrioting that more p r o- highly touted version of the
perly belonged on a low-budget Mark Twain classic. While wash-
TV movie-of-the-week. ing off a cut on Jim (Paul Win-
Barbra Streisand's latest vehi- field's) neck, the Shermans'
cle, For Pete's Sake, had a few Huck (played by Jeff East)
bright moments, but generally gravely exclaims "Jim! Your
consisted of not much more than blood's red - same as mine!"
a few stereotypes loosely tied I nearly dropped my popcorn
together with some half-heart- at that.
ed jokes - jokes which usually. Yet while there were low
dropped like lead from the silv- points like these, this summer's
er screen. sixty or so entrants into the
Walt Disney's 90-minute-long race for the box office dollar
Volkswagen commercial, Herb- were a generally better than
ie Rides Again (or the further average group. Frankly, I don't
adventures of the Love Bug), see how some the the super-
couldn't even manage to keep charged "superfilms" coming
the kids entertained when the before December - including
magic yellow Volks wasn't on Airport 1975, The Towering In-
screen. ferno, and The Godfather, Part
(On the other hand, Castaway II - can in the end really hope
Cowboy, which showed up in to compete.
don't deserve
into a corner
Juggernaut a
don Adventure
opening next
then, a quick
this summer's
der.
The summer
to get nushed
by the likes of
would-be Posei-
II that s t a r t s
week. Perhaps,'
glance back' at
movies is in or-
of '74 is almost;
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make it- sound better. I knew
what I had to do; I had to fire
about four guys. One thing I'll
say about the band now - I'd
like for it to stay exactly as it
is. They're wonderful guys -
disposition, attitude, they have
clean habits and they're great
in the band, plus singer Anita
Moore and trumpeter-leader El-
lington.
Ellington says that at first he
thought he'd spend this sum-
mer getting the band in shape.
"Because of the amount of cov-
erage given Pop's funeral,
certain to be remembered as a
summer that belonged to the
directors. The period's two best
pictures. Chinatown and Cali-
fornia Split, were both marked
by some of the best behind-
the-camera work seen in an
American film in years.
Tn Chinatown, Roman Polan-
ski managed to create the sha-
dowy '30s-ish image that Ro-
bert Towne's script called forl
while still injecting a modern
sene of horror and pacing.
Antly aided by striking per-
formances from leads Jack'
Nicholson and Faye Dunaway,
Polanski created an almost per-
fect portrait of a long-forgotten
period of California history.
Robert Altman develoned a
similar portrait in California
Split by exploiting what r e-
searchers tell us is the most
audience-affecting segment of
the film medium: the s o u n d
track. Through careful manipu-
lation of a track that at times
included input from up to 13
microphones, Altman brilliant-
Iv hyned up the viewer, filling
him with adrenalin at a pace
just equal to that of the on-!
screen gambling duo enjoyingt
a winning streak (George Segal
and Elliot Gould).
But there were still o t h e r
excellent films this summer.
Francis Ford Coppola's T h e
Conversation, the Cannes Festi-
val winner, also exploited sound
- although not quite as ambi-
tiously as Split. Coppola h e r e
k
t
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guitnr, is cleaning out the base-
; nient of the building housing
the Ellington office, to see what,
music, maybe unpublished, un-
performed or long lost, is there.
Also, there is a search for
tapes made at recording ses-
sions and never released. A
Have a flair for \
artistic writinq?
If you are Interest-
ed in reviewing
poetry, and musc
or writing feature
stories a b o ui t the
drama, dance, film
arts: Contact Arts
Editor, c/o The
Michigan Daily.
the price and afer we piayeu,
hie., gave us the original price.
He said, 'We asked for the!
Duke Ellington Orchestra and!
we got it."'
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